Love Leads the Way
by SkylarRocaineDaughterofHermes
Summary: The girls get kidnapped by Aphrodite and it's up to the guys to save them. Using a series of clues given to them by Aphrodite, they have to go and save their true loves. Couples are Percabeth, Thalico, Tratie, Jasper, Leyna, Frazel, Skylar/Will, Seph/James, and McKenna/Zach... Rated T for language.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: This is my new story, co authored by… SephCurrentDaughterofPoseido n and McKennaSuaveDaughterofPoseid on! :D Enjoy! Couples are Skylar/Will, Seph/James, McKenna/Zach, Percabeth, Thalico, Tratie, Jasper, Frazel, and Leyna.**

**Nico had been aged during the war so he is the same age as everyone else.**

**Camp Jupiter was destroyed and rebuilt by Camp Half-Blood.**

**This is the winter after the war with Gaea. **

**Disclaimer: We sadly don't own PJO or HoO**

Seph POV

I was walking down the beach, hand in hand with James. We were laughing about some prank that he and the Stolls had pulled on the Iris cabin.

"Then to top it all off," he said, "we painted the whole cabin the best color in the world!"

"And what was that?" I asked, leaning on him. He pulled me close and kissed my forehead.

"Sky blue of course!"

I looked up at him with a raised eyebrow, "You know the prettiest blue out there is blue-green."

"No," he insisted lightly, "I'm sorry, sky-blue is better."

I shook my head, and pulled away from him, so I could look at him, to see if he was serious. "Come on, James, you know that blue-green is better."

He was starting to get a small crease in his eyebrow, but I ignored it, how angry could he get over a color? "Sky blue, just like Jupiter's domain," he insisted.

"Blue green, like the sea," I countered.

"Oh," he said snappishly, "you mean the domain that is run by the god of earthquakes?"

I frowned, "What's wrong with earthquakes?"

"You know what!" he snapped viciously.

"James, you know that Poseidon did not mean to do that to your mother!" I exclaimed. "I can't believe that you would bring that up! And if we are going down that road, don't even get me started on lightning!"

James glared at me. "What, Seph?" he demanded. "What about lightning?"

"Oh, you know, just your dad trying to kill me, my mother and my siblings!" I informed him heatedly.

James opened his mouth to say something when McKenna came running down with a troubled look on her face, but I was too distracted to care.

McKenna POV

You ever have one of those deep gut feelings that something is about to explode? Well I had that exact feeling when I walked into the beach by Seph and James.

The feeling reminded me of two armies facing off, and it was only seconds before one of the sides would shoot first.

"Well," James said in a savage voice, "if your mother was half as annoying as you, I can't say that I blame him!"

I stood there, completely still. That was a very low blow, I never even knew that James could be that mean. My mouth was open, and I felt hot anger rising, I know he didn't talk to my sister that way!

Seph was shaking in pure fury; her eyes were burning a shade of green so dark they were almost grey. She sucked in a sharp breath, and I knew what was coming. "You complete jackass! I cannot believe that you just said that you would _approve_ of killing my mother! What's next? Are you going to kill me? And if you find me annoying, imagine how I find you! Screw you James!"

"GODS," he exclaimed, "YOU'RE IMPOSSIBLE, I CAN SEE WHY MATT CHEATED ON YOU!"

That was a low blow, lower than the rest! Seph just stood there; I saw her eyes become shiny and bright. She was holding back tears.

"Oh, Jupiter," James muttered, looking at Seph with wide eyes, guilt was thick in them. He reached out with a hand, "Seph… I swear-"

"Save it," she snapped. With that she did the last thing I ever thought I would see her do, she ran away.

That left me alone with James, not exactly where I fancied being at the present time. James looked at me pleadingly. I walked over close to him and looked at him for a moment in utter disgust. "Bastard," I spat, before taking my hand and bitch slapping him as hard as I could across the cheek.

After that I turned around, and took off after my sister, leaving James alone.

Skylar POV

I was walking down the row of cabins looking for Will.

He wanted to try (try being the key word) to teach me how to use a bow and arrow. Even after all my failed attempts, he still wouldn't give up.

I strolled into the Apollo cabin, knowing he was probably there. Apollo and my dad were buds, so I didn't think he would mind that much.

Will was sitting on his bunk. He hadn't noticed me yet.

He was strumming something on his guitar. After humming along to it for a little bit, he stopped and wrote something in the notebook next to him.

I decided to make my presence known. "Hey, you ready?" I asked.

He looked up and smiled. "Hey. Yea, one second."

After putting his notebook and guitar away, he went to the case at the foot of his bed and opened it. He froze. "Is this some kind of joke?" he said angrily.

I walked up to him. "What? What happened?"

"My bow and arrow are missing!" He clenched his fists and started looking around for them.

I couldn't help it. I burst out laughing. A bow and arrow. That's what all the fuss was about? Wow…

He glared at me. "Skylar, give it back."

"I don't have it." I said.

"Skylar, it was a gift from my dad. Give. It. Back." He seethed, trying to stay calm.

"Really, I don't have it! Why would you assume that?" I frowned.

"Who else could have it?"

"Uh… the rest of my cabin!"

"The rest of your cabin would be too busy stealing stuff from the camp store to take my bow and arrow."

"Well, I don't have it!" I was getting annoyed now.

"Gods, Skylar! Can you just tell the truth for once and give me back my stuff? Sometimes I wonder why I'm even going out with you in the first place!"

I froze. Did he really just say that? Tears started welling up in my eyes, like a waterfall that wasn't allowed to fall. I dropped my head so he wouldn't see.

"No, wait, I didn't mean-"

"Yes you did." I said quietly. I looked up at him. "Look, I may be a daughter of Hermes, and I may lie to everyone in this freaking camp, but I would _never_ lie to you, ever." And the dam broke. Tears were streaming down my face. "I thought that you of all people knew me better than that."

Before he could respond, I turned and ran out of the cabin. I didn't know where I was going, I just let my feet take me somewhere, anywhere, that wasn't _here_.

I ran after Seph… Who I just lost….

All of a sudden I heard screams from the lake… Crap.

I started running, while taking off my shoes at the same time, which was really hard.

The ground vibrated… I better had go calm her down before somebody got hurt.

I dove into the lake, and headed for the small cave.

"Seph!" I shouted.

"Go AWAY!" She yelled.

"I will not GO AWAY!" I replied, sitting next to her, hugging her.

She cried into my shoulder, as I patted her back, giving her comforting words.

"Hey, how about we get back to our cabin? I heard Percy has a secret stash of his mom's blue chocolate chip cookies in his sock drawer…" I said coaxingly.

Feeling her nod into my shoulder, I summoned the water below us to teleport us back into the cabin.

After she was settled, I went outside.

Quietly closing the cabin door, I sneaked away, hoping to get some peace.

Looking left to right, I dashed over across to Hera's cabin, leaning against the wall.

Then I heard footsteps getting closer, so I jumped into the plush green bush to my left, concealing myself into its green leaves.

As soon as I couldn't hear them I ran to the beach yearning for the comfort of the waves.

Upon reaching the sand, I tossed off my socks, and wriggled my toes through the soft white pristine sand.

"SNAP!" I jerked up from my spot seeking cover behind some nearby trees, squishing myself into its bark.

I then saw the Aphrodite slut, Lindsey Gordon, bitch extraordinaire.

I sucked in my breath when I saw who she was with… Zach.

The Bitc- Erm… Lindsey, stood on her tippy toes, joining lips with him.

Before I could stop myself, I squeaked, interrupting "their moment".

"Who's there?" Lindsey smirked.

Gathering up of what was left of my heart, I ran from my hiding spot, dashing past a surprised Zach and a gleeful Lindsey.

"MCKENNA! WAIT!" I heard Zach yell.

I continued to run back to my cabin, ignoring him. I was only 30 yards away from my destination.

Just them something grabbed me from behind and lifted me up.

"PUT ME DOWN!" I screamed, as he carried me to "our" spot in the woods.

He then set me down, and I punched him hard in the jaw, bruising both my hand and his cheek.

"I can explai-"

"EXPLAIN MY ASS!" I yelled cutting him off, tears almost pouring out of my eyes.

He stepped closer to me, and I stepped back, not looking into his eyes.

"McKenna, please just listen to me," he pleaded softly, tilting my face up to him.

"No, I can't. I- Here." I stepped away from him, unclasping the seashell locket he gave me a few months back, and took his hand, dumping it and its chain into his palm.

"I hope you're happy now," I cried, before running off to the cabin.

Quickly slamming the door, locking it, I slumped down against the door, and buried my face into my knees sobbing.

"McKenna! What happened?" Seph asked, alarmed. Her and Percy both sat down next to me, very alarmed.

Continuing to cry, I leaned against Seph, who hugged me tightly.

"Was it… Zach?" Percy asked, anger building up.

I sobbed even harder, nodding.

"That sick bastard, once I get ahold of him I'll-"

"He's not worth it!" I croaked. "And plus, you're only wearing Nylan Cat boxers!" I cried, starting to sob again.

Percy sat back down hugging both me and Seph.

Life sure does suck.

Katie POV

"Stoll!" I screeched.

I stormed out of my cabin. People around me were gaping.

Why? Because children of Demeter were supposed to have brown hair, not green!

I started going over to the Hermes cabin when I heard a laugh, a specific laugh to be exact.

And it was coming from a tree.

I walked over right under it. "Stoll, you better get down here." I seethed.

"Idiot, why'd you laugh!?" a voice that sounded like Connor said.

Then I heard a shove and Travis fell out of the tree right in front of me.

He got up and brushed himself off. Then he looked at me as if nothing had happened. "Hey Gardner, what brings you to these fine parts?"

"My. Hair. Stoll." I said through clenched teeth.

He looked at it as if noticing it for the first time. "Huh, funny choice in color you got there…"

"Stoll, I swear to Demeter, if you don't tell me how to fix this, I will freaking hurt you! Why do you always have to prank me? I mean, isn't there someone else in this entire camp that you could torture? Why! Me! You have nothing better to do and it's honestly just the most annoying thing!"

"Gods, shut up! You think people actually _like_ having you yell at them like some stuck up little bitch? News flash! They don't! So you can stop acting like such a princess and go back to wherever the hell you came from! This whole camp would be way better without you anyways!"

That's it. I bitch slapped him across the face, tears falling rapidly from my eyes.

"Gods damned, Katie! What was that for!?" clutching his cheek.

"I'll let you figure that out." I said coldly, turning on my heel and running away.

Reyna POV

He. Would. Not. Go. Away.

I swear, if he didn't leave in 0.5 seconds, my head was going to explode.

"And then, I was all, 'Dude, we have to fight _that_?', and he was all-"

"Shut up!" I yelled, not being able to take it anymore.

He looked at me strangely. "No… he said-"

"No! I mean _you_, Leo! Can't you see I'm trying to work?"

"Well, take a break! I mean, honestly! All you ever do is work."

"Well, if I didn't work, then we wouldn't have the battle plans for capture the flag ready."

"Well, maybe you should leave that to someone else. It didn't work so well last time, we lost remember?"

"That's because there was a spy!" I said, my voice rising. "And the ones I designed for the war against the giants worked!"

"That's because we had good fighters!"

"And a good strategy!"

"Gods, you're so frustrating! I'm the one who saved you! You'd be dead if it weren't for me! Maybe I should have just let you die." He finished coldly.

I froze. That's the last thing our father had said to me and Hylla before he abandoned us when we were young. Tears started falling down my face.

Leo stared at me in shock, frozen in place. I _never_ cried, ever. "Reyna…"

"Shut the Pluto up, Leo! Just leave." I pointed to the door.

His eyes were full of pain and guilt. But he listened and slowly walked out the door.

When he left, I buried my face into my pillow and cried.

Hazel POV

I was walking down the path from the Hades/Pluto cabin, when I saw Leo walking.

Every time I saw him, I would blush. I didn't blush because I liked him; it was because he reminded me so much of Sammy. I felt terrible about it, because I really did have feelings for Frank; he was a great guy!

He smiled at me and waved. I nodded and waved back, quickly turning my head so he didn't see the look on my face.

I took a deep breath and decided to go to the Ares/Mars cabin to see Frank.

When I got there he was literally tearing the cabin apart. "Frank!" I called, and I got no response. I decided to try again, this time a bit louder. "FRANK!" this time he snapped his head up. He was dripping with sweat and had a frantic look on his face.

"Where is it?" he asked

"What?" I questioned.

"My stick, did you take it?"

"Frank, why the Pluto would I have your stick?"

"I don't know," he snapped, checking under a random bunk bed.

I backed up a bit. I knew that he was frantic, but Frank was never like this. "Calm down, Frank," I said soothingly, "we'll find it."

That was when he stood up and looked at me, his eyes blazed with something that resembled fury, he looked like he was going to bust into elephant form any second. "Yeah, you'd like to find it wouldn't you, you'd probably burn it yourself!"

"What?" I squeaked, feeling hurt.

"You don't think I see the way you look at him! I know you have feelings for Valdez! It's always painted over your face whenever he's by. But I guess you're only with me because you feel bad, isn't that right? You probably thinking, 'Wow, he's pathetic!' You'd burn it, that way you wouldn't have to go through the trouble of breaking up with me!"

I stood there, my jaw stiff, trying to hold in the tears that were threatening to break free. "Frank, you know what, I have feelings for one person, and one person only, you. But I guess you don't feel the same way, or else you wouldn't bother questioning my feelings. I hope you find your stick."

"Haze…" Frank said, through my blurry eyes, I saw him, a concerned look implanted on his face, you could tell he felt guilty, but I didn't care.

"Don't call me that!" I shouted. He walked forward, but I backed away, "Just stay away from me!" With that I ran out of the cabin, not even looking back.

Thalia POV

I was leaning on the side of Zeus's Fist for about an hour, waiting for Nico to come.

Getting annoyed, I walked all the way to the Hades cabin, literally banging on the door.

Nico answered tiredly, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

"Thalia... I did it again, didn't I?"

"Uh… Yeah, you did!" I told him.

"Look I'm-"

"You better not say sorry! Why are you always in the Underworld anyways?! Is there something I should know about?!"

"Gods, I'm a son of Hades! What do you expect? Me to always be by your side? What is SO important about today anyways!?" He yelled at me.

Did he really forget? Tears started to fall down my face.

"Well," I said, my voice bitter and quivering, "yesterday was the winter solstice. What would that make today?"

"How the Hades am I supposed to know!?" He didn't seem affected by my tears.

I stared at him for a while. "You know what? Screw you, Nico di Angelo. Screw you. Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta go and send a birthday card to myself."

I spun around and started running, but not before seeing the shocked looked on his face as he realized what he had done.

Annabeth POV

"Perfect!" I told myself, completing yet another building.

I smiled while rolling up my masterpiece and placing it into a tube.

Capping the tube, I sat up and stood on my chair, placing the tube onto the self above me which contained my other drawings.

I hopped off of the chair, landing on both of my feet.

Striding out the door with a huge smile plastered on my face, I headed towards the Poseidon cabin.

I wonder what ole' Seaweed Brain is doing.

Before I could even knock the door was slammed open, an angry Percy striding past me, not even acknowledging me.

"Hey Percy!" I said in a cheery voice.

He didn't even stop.

"Percy?" I tried again.

Okay, nothing was going to ruin this fantastic mood I was in, not even Seaweed Brain.

So I then blocked his path, smiling the best I could.

"Hia, Seaweed Brain!" I spoke with as much enthusiasm as I could.

"Move Annabeth," he told me in a monotone voice.

"Is everything alright?" I asked, full of concern.

"No, everything's not alright!" He snapped.

My good mood deflated, and anger started to boil up inside of me.

"Don't you dare snap at me!"

"Yes, mother," He said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

I glared at him, and blocked his way again after he tried going around me.

"Gods Annabeth! MOVE OUT OF MY WAY! WHY ARE YOU SO ANNOYING?! No wonder people don't hang out with you!"

My mouth gaped open, then shut immediately, and I felt the tears fall down my cheek.

His face then turned guilty, and I turned running.

"ANNABETH WAIT!" he shouted, chasing after me.

"FUCK OFF!" I yelled, dashing into my cabin, slamming and locking the door.

Flinging myself onto my bunk, I sobbed into the pillow clutching it as tightly as I could.  
Last thing I remembered, was the pain in my now crushed heart.

Piper POV

I was walking down to the lava wall; Jason was going to teach me how to climb it without getting killed.

I was almost there when a random boy popped out of practically nowhere. He had bright blue eyes, and his hair was so blonde that it was almost platinum, along with his tanned skin, it was impossible to mistaken him for anyone other than a son of Apollo. In other words, it was Mikel.

I smiled at him, and he smiled back shyly. "Hey, Pipes!"

"Hi," I said brightly.

"We still on for tonight?" he asked.

"Of course, you know I would never back out on you!"

He smiled in apparent relief, "Of course I do."

You see, Mikel was really nervous about asking Elizabeth Coleman, daughter of Hermes out on a date. She was his best friend and kind of a tomboy. He would have gone to the other Aphrodite girls, but he figured that I would take a less extreme approach to helping him.

"Well," he said, "I guess I'll see you later." And with that he walked off.

I was about to continue on to the lava wall, when Jason himself came walking up, and he had a look on his face that said that he was ready to kill, which disturbed me, he didn't have that look a lot. I smiled at him, and he just frowned at me, as if I'd punched his grandmother.

"Something wrong, Jason?"

"Yeah, there is something wrong!" he snapped.

I raised an eyebrow; he never talked to me like that. "Well, are you going to tell me, or am I going to have to guess," I replied icily, two could play at that game.

"I had no idea you had another boyfriend!" he exclaimed.

I frowned at him, what in the name of Hades what he going on about. That was when it hit me, and I felt so hurt that he would even think that I would even consider cheating on him.

"Well," I said so coldly, Khione would be jealous. "I hope you know that I don't have any boyfriends, because any boyfriend of mine would know that I would never cheat on him, and he would also know the difference between someone asking _me_ out, and me helping a boy ask his _friend_ out. Because he would know that if anyone even tried to ask me out that I would pull Katropis on them."

I spun around and left him there, looking stunned. Well I hoped that he was happy, because I sure wasn't.

Lou Ellen POV

I was walking from my cabin to the beach when out of nowhere, a tall shape came and crashed into me.

We both fell, him landing on top of me.

I looked up to see the frantic face of Connor Stoll. His eyes were wandering around until he looked down and realized he was on top of me.

He got up and pulled me up with one hand. "Sorry bout that, I was kinda in a rush…" he said, rubbing the back of his neck.

I smiled. "It's fine. Just out of curiosity, what were you running from exactly?"

"Uh… Travis…" He said, a bit apprehensively.

"Why?" I said, confused.

He told me the quick story. They pranked Katie, and he pushed his brother out of a tree.

I laughed. "Only you Connor, only you."

He grinned. "Yep!" he said proudly.

I rolled my eyes. "But that still wasn't nice." I scolded. "You shouldn't have left him."

His smile left his face as quickly as it appeared. "It's not that big of a deal…"

"You left your brother to face the wrath of Katie while you just lounged around doing nothing!"

"It can't be that bad!"

"Yes it can!" I was starting to get aggravated now. "You can't just keep going around breaking the rules and not get caught or have to face the consequences!"

He rolled his eyes. "Well that's what I do! And you're gonna have to deal with it!"

"Why don't you make me! And your brother is gonna be pissed, you traitor!" I yelled.

"Gods, shut up! And you would know about being a traitor, wouldn't you!? Probably learned that from mommy dearest before the titan war!" he growled.

I froze and stared at him wide eyed.

He gasped as he realized what he'd just said. "No, wait. Lou, I didn't mean-"

"Fuck off." I said, trying to stay calm, even though my voice was shaking and tears were rapidly falling from my eyes.

I spun around and ran towards the woods. Screw the beach… er, no offence Lord Poseidon.

I heard Connor's voice calling my name behind me, but I paid no attention to that. Nor to where I was running, I was just running.

**AN: Damn, this be long… Well check out the stories about Jeph, Skill, and ZaKenna on our profiles! :) Review! Love ya!**

**~Nessa**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Thanks so much for all your reviews! :D**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Nobody POV

Olympus, the only place where there is peace and tranquility.

"HADES, WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS!" Poseidon yelled.

"POSEIDON, I AM GOING TO KILL YOU!" Athena screeched.

"HERMES, YOU BETTER GET YOUR ASS OFF OF YOUR THRONE BEFORE I VAPORIZE YOU!" Demeter screamed.

"APOLLO, WHY ARE YOU SO HOT?!" Apollo cried.

You remember when I said peace and tranquility? I take that back.

Hephaestus ducked just as a knife lodged itself into his throne, right where his head was about two seconds ago.

"ARES!" Hephaestus roared.

"NO! NO! NO! THAT IS NOT THE WAY TO DO IT TRAVIS! NO! Ahhh… too late…" Aphrodite sobbed.

Everyone, especially Hermes and a curious Demeter turned their heads toward Aphrodite, who was currently watching all of her "couples" on the holographic screen in front of her.

One by one, they all rushed over to gather around the screen, to see all of their children with half of a pink heart over their sad faces on the monitor…

"Aphrodite…. What did you just do?" Athena asked, trying to stay calm.

"I d-didn't do any th-thing! Th…THEY ALL BROKE UP!" she wailed, "Percabeth, ZaKenna, Jeph, Skill, Tratie, Leyna, Jasper, Thalico, Frazel…"

They stared at her in shock. (**AN: Leyna, Tratie, and Conellen were technically never going out… but the rest of them were**)

She sniffled. "How could this happen? They were all on my 'for eternity' list. And I only put the most special couples on that!"

She huffed, and with a snap of her fingers, teleported back to her bedroom. She crashed down on her pink, plush love seat and continued watching what had happened on her flat screen tv.

Back in the throne room, things were not very pretty. The gods were just… glaring at each other.

Athena glared at Poseidon, Poseidon glared at Hades and Zeus, Zeus glared at Hades, Hades glared at Ares, Demeter glared at Hermes, Hermes glared at Apollo, and if Aphrodite and Bellona had been there, they would've been glaring at Zeus and Hephaestus.

All at once, shouting broke out.

"What the Hades is wrong with your son!?" Athena screamed at Poseidon.

"Hey, I take offense to that!" Hades said defensively.

"Do I look like I care!?" she seethed.

"You should!" he snapped.

"No, Hades, there is something wrong with your son!" Zeus roared.

"Yeah?" Hades snapped. "Well look what his daughter," Hades jabbed his thumb at Poseidon, "did to Zach!"

"He cheated on her!" Poseidon snapped. Then he glared at Zeus, "Speaking of cheating, did you see what James did to Persephone?"

Zeus glared and changed form for a second, "He did not mean that!"

"Don't give me that, Jupiter, you… Zeus, you're kids are all the same!" Look at what Jason did to Piper!"

Zeus would have answered back, but he was drowned out by Demeter shouting at Hermes. "Look at what your monster did to my daughter!"

"Come on, Demeter," Hermes said, "your daughter is so uptight, I don't blame him for getting frustrated!"

"Hermes," Demeter snapped, "I don't care how uptight someone is, that is no reason to say half the things that your son just said to Katie!"

Hermes had no answer, but that wouldn't have mattered, because it would have been drowned out by the conversation that Athena and Poseidon were currently having. "Your son has to be the dumbest person I have ever met," Athena screeched, "Annabeth could have done so much better, but she settled for him, and he goes and treats her like that!"

"What do you mean she settled for Percy?" Poseidon demanded. "She was the one luck to have Percy for a boyfriend. She seems to have a lot of your qualities, I would have snapped at her years ago!"

Athena was about to retort when she was interrupted by Hermes and Apollo.

"How could your son do this?" Hermes demanded.

"She is your daughter," Apollo reasoned. "There was no need for her to react the way she did!"

"Yeah right," Hermes said, "he broke her heart, Apollo!"

This argument was drowned out by someone shouting, "QUIET!" All of the gods fell silent. "SIT!" They all looked at the figure walking in the throne room in alarm.

Once everyone was in their seat, Aphrodite was the only person that was standing. She had a determined look on her face that made it clear that she was going to get what she wanted.

"What is it, Aphrodite," Athena questioned.

"We're going to get them back together!" she announced.

The gods stared at her blankly; this was her area of expertise, after all.

"Now!" clapped Aphrodite.

"Poseidon! Do you still own that 'Beach House'?"

Poseidon's eyes narrowed, "Yes… why do you ask…?"

Aphrodite smiled widely, making the rest of the gods/goddesses a little nervous.

"Well if we teleport them-"

"Aphrodite! You know what that Beach House was!" Poseidon said.

"And? If you want her on good terms with you, you would let me send them there! Please!? At least until every couple is back together, happy?"

"Did you see what happened to some of them?" Poseidon questioned. "All of them actually! They're never getting back together, and you're forgetting that none of us necessarily want them back together. I warned James, warned him not to hurt Seph! The only reason that I haven't killed him yet, is because I imagine that she could prolong the pain a bit, and it might make her feel better. Percy and Annabeth were a bad call from the start, McKenna and a death spawn that is almost as hard to believe as the rest of them, giving Percy's history with Hades. And you want them back together?"

"And as for the forever list," Athena stated, "you are forgetting that there are three couples with just children of the Big Three, can anyone see where that might be a bad thing futuristically?"

Everyone paused for a moment, taking in what she said.

"Then," she continued, "None of the other ones are particularly weak: Demeter's favorite child, a Stoll, Skylar Rocaine, who has the blessing of Hermes, Apollo's favorite son, a son of Jupiter, and a powerful charmspeaking daughter of Aphrodite, a daughter of Pluto, a son of Mars, with Poseidon's blood in him, not to mention that he can shape shift, my own favorite child, and a powerful son of Poseidon."

Everyone was still silent, waiting for her to spell out the answer.

She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, so much for them figuring it out for themselves. "You understand that if they don't kill themselves, and somehow magically get back together, they are bound to have kids someday, and those kids are going to be powerful, are we sure that is wise allowing this?"

The gods started murmuring amongst themselves, debating about what Athena said, while Aphrodite was glaring at her. The gods were starting to go in the favor of what Athena said, Aphrodite had to stop them, and there was only one way that she knew how.

"QUIET," she shouted.

The gods fell silent and looked at her again. "Now," she said tightly, "this is going to happen whether you like it or not. If you are wondering why, I'll enlighten you. This is my area of expertise, not yours. And if you don't want terrible love lives for the next ten millennia, I would suggest that you leave it alone, because it will happen anyway! All of these people are your kids, your own children! And you just don't get it, they are in love! They still are, I can sense it, and if you care about your kids you'll let me get them out of this hurt, because heartbreak is terrible!"

All of the gods looked away in guilt, even Athena looked as if she felt bad. "Very well, Aphrodite," Poseidon mumbled.

All of the gods that had a child in the predicament nodded or muttered in assent.

Aphrodite nodded in approval, and then said, "Now you're being proper parents!"

"When do they start?" Hermes asked.

"As soon as possible," then she snapped her fingers, and disappeared from the throne room, leaving behind the smell of designer perfume, and a feeling of love in the air.

**AN: There's a LOT of glaring going around :P Review! Peace!**

**~Nessa**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: We're baaaack! To the guest that reviewed, we took off the stories on the other accounts. And also, if you're a guest, how do you have access to the guidelines page? Cus, if you have an account, why did you review as a guest…?**

**So here is the chapter! :)**

**Disclaimer: We don't own PJO or HoO…**

Skylar POV

I ran out of Will's cabin, tears streaming down my face. I didn't know where I was going, I just had to get away from there.

I saw Leo walking towards the Bellona cabin with a determined look on his face, mixed with something that resembled… guilt?

I ran into my cabin and crashed down onto the couch in the front room. I didn't want to do anything.

I dug my iPod out from my pocket and put on my headphones. As I pressed shuffle, the first song that came on was Stereo Hearts.

That was _our_ song.

I tore my headphones out and threw my iPod at the wall across from me, nearly missing Travis, who came stumbling in. It didn't break though; it was a gift from Hermes so it couldn't.

Travis looked at me and suddenly got an outraged look on his face. "What happened?" He asked, coming and sitting next to me.

"W-will…" I broke down again, crying harder than before. Saying his name out loud only made it worse.

He stood up suddenly and clenched his fists together. "That's it. I'm gonna go and-"

"No!" I squeaked. "Don't do that." I looked up at him. "Wait, why is your cheek all red?" I hadn't noticed that before.

He bit his lip. "Gardner…"

I stared blankly at him. "Hold up. _Katie_ did this? She wouldn't hurt a fly!"

"Well, I may have said… some things." He said nervously, as if worried about my reaction to all this.

"Like what?" I said, eyeing him. Katie was one of my best friends. If he hurt her, he knew I would never let him live it down.

"Um, not that much… just-that-the-camp-would-be-better-without-her…" He said quickly, flinching at the end.

I felt the anger build up inside of me. But I forced myself to calm down. "Well, fix it."

He stared at me in shock. "Wha…?"

I rolled my eyes. "What? Did you expect me to slap you too?" He slightly nodded. "I'm going to pretend I didn't see that. Now go and fix it."

I spun around and walked out of the cabin, fully aware that I still had tear marks on my cheeks and puffy red eyes.

I started walking around aimlessly until I realized I was at the beach. And so was Will.

This was the place where we'd had our first kiss, where we'd finally gotten together, where he'd told me he loved me…

He was staring out at the waves crashing onto the shore. He sighed and turned around to see me standing there.

He winced upon seeing the hurt look on my face as well as the tears.

"Skylar…" He said, his voice thick with guilt.

I felt hot tears sting my eyes. I couldn't do this. I just couldn't.

I started running the opposite direction.

I stumbled into the woods as I heard him yelling my name. He was running after me, that much I knew.

I kept going deeper and deeper, past the creek, until everything became unfamiliar. Finally I broke down against a tree.

After a few minutes, I stood up and looked around. I had never been in this part of the woods. It was getting darker every second. I heard some rustling noises and the hoot of an owl.

I began walking in the general direction from which I'd come.

I felt a sudden chill behind me. I spun around, grabbing onto the hilt of Aoratos.

The shadows were moving around taunting me. The wind was blowing through the trees, creating a wailing sound that chilled me down to the bone.

The shadows started collecting up and then they shot towards me. I barely had time to let a scream pass through my lips before they washed over me and I fell unconscious.

Seph POV

To say that I was agitated would have been an understatement. I was comforting McKenna and considering what to do next, and the solution that I had was to take some of my frustration on Zach, then possibly James. I couldn't, though, because I had a crying younger sister to take care of.

"McKenna," I said quietly, and she stopped her sobs for a moment, "I am going to go and grab Piper, she would probably be the best person to talk to."

She looked up at me with tear filled eyes, and I was ready to murder the person that did this. She nodded, and I got up from the floor and walked out of the cabin, and what I saw made me want to run back inside. It was James, and he was looking at me. I felt the tears welling up in my eyes again, but I refused to let them fall.

That brought back a painful memory.

_We were about to fight an army of powerful demigods, they'd gotten their power from Gaea, and there was a very good chance that we were going to die. James and I'd just made peace, and I was telling him to be careful. The very thought of losing him made me want to cry. _

_A tear traced down my cheek, and he wiped it off, and made me look him in the eyes._

_"Hey," he whispered, "you ever heard that saying 'no boy is worth your tears'?"_

_I nodded, confused about where the conversation was going._

_"Well then don't cry over me," he said quietly. Then he leaned down touching his lips lightly to mine._

I snapped out of my flashback, and I walked off, refusing to acknowledge him. My breaths were coming out in ragged gasps, as I tried to stifle the tears, but eventually I managed to bring down the hysteria. I continued my search for Piper.

Finally, I saw the daughter of Aphrodite walking, more like stalking from the general direction of the climbing wall. I walked over to her and she stopped, staring at me questioningly, her eyes were a deep shade of grey, and she seemed to glow animosity, not toward me, but I could still feel it. "Is there something wrong?" I questioned.

"Yeah," she sighed, "Jason is being a complete jackass, and now he is my…." She trailed off, and her eyes were starting to become shiny, oh gods. One tear fell, then two, then ten, until she was sobbing uncontrollably.

Automatically, I walked up, and hugged her tightly, hoping to every god out there, that her and Jason were still together, we'd had enough heartbreak that day.

"He accused me of cheating, Seph, I-I was so lucky to have him, and he thought that I would cheat on him," she managed between sobs.

The term cheating made my heart pang, but I ignored it. "Don't worry, Piper, Jason is too smart to think that you would cheat on him."

She was shaking uncontrollably, whether from sadness or anger, I had no idea, all I knew was that she was seriously shaken up over it.

"Looks like all sons of the big three are being jackasses today."

She looked at me with wide eyes, "What do you mean by that?"

So I told her what happened to McKenna, but I kept the part about James to myself, I didn't really want to think about that at the moment, it hurt too much.

"I'll go and talk to her." Piper looked at me again, this time questioningly, "What are you going to do?"

I didn't feel like lying, so I said, "I have a certain son of Hades to find."

I thought that Piper was going to stop me, but she just nodded, and walked off, leaving me to my own devices.

I took a deep breath and started a new search. There was just one problem with my brilliant plan, everywhere I looked; I was hit with a memory of James. Some good, some bad, but all made me want to crawl somewhere and cry my heart out.

The last spot that I checked was in the forest, and that was the place that hurt the most. When I was halfway thought, I saw a large knobby tree and that brought back a memory that brought me to my knees.

_The battle that we fought against the demigods was in the forest. We'd won just seconds before. I was at the newly recreated Zeus' fist when I spotted James He was cut up and bloody, but he didn't seem to be seriously injured. He was alive._

_Without thinking about it, I ran over and jumped in his arms, completely ignoring the wolf whistles and whooping that I heard behind me. He touched my forehead with his, and started singing my favorite song softly to me, rocking us both backward and forward._

I stumbled over to the tree, and touched it; hot tears fell out of my eyes. I turned my back to it and slid down, putting my head in my hands crying my broken heart out.

I don't know how long I stayed like that, but Zach was wiped out of my mind, so was everything other than James, everything about him was running through my mind, from his way of speaking, to his smile.

When I thought I would explode from misery, I started to feel sleepy, which was strange, considering that it was still pretty early. But I just ignored it, and concentrated on the ache that I felt, trying to get rid of it.

The sleepiness was becoming too much, but it was also inviting, as if it would wash away all my worries, that I could do with, so I sighed and let the darkness wash over me, pulling me under in to blissful unawareness.

McKenna POV

I shouldn't have been crying right now…

I turned over in my bed, making a cocoon with the sheets.

Life sucks…

The door creaked open, causing me to tense up.

"McKenna?" I heard someone call out.

"Go away!" I softly yelled.

The door closed and footsteps came over to Seph's bunk (which I was currently using).

Arms wrapped around me and pulled me into a comforting hug.

I looked up to find Piper, her eyes looking at me, a clear gray color.

Unwrapping my arms from the sheets, I returned the hug, my heart still in my throat, choking me.

"Is it always this painful?" I asked her.

"I'm afraid so, but everything will get better"

She hugged me tighter, rocking me slightly.

A yawn escaped my lips, causing Piper to stop rocking me.

"Sleep, soundly," I heard her say, as she softly got up, heading towards the door.

I laid down, my eyelids slowly closing, the blackness engulfing me in peacefulness.

Piper POV

I left McKenna in her cabin, it was clear that she was tired, and I figured that maybe she would feel better after a nap.

I closed my eyes, and fought off the ache in my chest. Jason meant so much to me, then he went and questioned the way that I felt about him, apparently he didn't feel the same way.

I couldn't help it; a tear broke out of the dam and trailed its way down my cheek. I needed to be alone, and my cabin was not an option. There was a secret spot that only Jason and I knew about, but I doubt that he would look; he was probably too busy fuming about me 'cheating'. I quickly made my way to the outskirts of camp, refusing to look at anyone, I was pretty sure that I passed Jason, but I kept walking, I wanted to be alone.

When I made it to the miniature clearing at the very end of the camp, I sat back and closed my eyes, letting a memory take me.

_I was out on a walk with Jason. It was past curfew, but Jason said that he wanted to talk, and who was I to argue? We decided to walk away from the cabin's area and close to the forest in case the harpies decided to snoop around. We were talking about trivial things, but I knew there was something more important that he would want, so I decided to question him._

_"Jason," I said, "I believe that you didn't bring me out after curfew just for idle chit chat."_

_He looked at me for a moment, and then said, "You're right, I just don't have the nerve to say what I want to yet."_

_"Well," I laughed, "Spit it out, Jason, before the harpies find us!"_

_"I-I-I," he stuttered, he was red in the face and he wouldn't look at me. "I, um, like you, Piper… a lot."_

_I was in such shock, that I just froze, did he just say what I thought he said. I didn't say anything I didn't trust my voice. I was trying to form words coherently when I heard a gleeful cackle. Jason grabbed me by the arm and he flung the both of us sideways into the forest, with his son of Jupiter powers, he was able to make us go farther. When we stopped rolling, we were at the same clearing that I was currently in._

_One thing was slightly awkward; I was on top of him, looking straight into his blue eyes. Without even thinking about it, I leaned down and pressed my lips to his. When I pulled away, he was staring at me in shock, and I just smiled. "Guess that means that I like you too."_

Sleepiness shook me out of the memory, and maybe a small nap would do me good anyways. I closed my eyes, and drifted off, hoping to wake up to something more pleasant.

Reyna POV

After I finally stopped crying, I decided to go to the arena.

I found a few training dummies in the back that still were new. I started slashing at them, letting out all my pent up emotions towards that _idiot_, Valdez.

He was so frustrating (slash), insensitive (kick), annoying (stab), stupid, arrogant, strong, cute- wait. No. No, no, no.

Valdez was _not_ cute. He was a jerk.

Ahhh! I sliced the dummy's head off. The training dummy, not Leo.

I looked around. Wow. Everything was in shreds. I must have been really upset…

A crowd had formed around me, watching me tear apart everything in sight.

"What're you looking at?" I snarled, and they all backed away and started doing their own thing. Except for one person that is.

Leo.

Ahhh! There was nothing else to fight so I chucked my sword at a wall. It lodged itself nicely there, and everybody now left the arena all together.

He smiled sadly at me. "Hey Rey."

I turned to him, my eyes blazing with fury. "Do _not_ call me that, Valdez." I warned, threateningly.

His eyes turned steel cold. "Or what _Rey_? What are you going to do? I came here to apologize for before, but you know, maybe I won't."

I looked at him. "Then don't" I said softly. "My dad didn't either. He just left us."

He stared at me. I could see the shock that was evident on his face.

I slumped down against the wall. "Just leave. Please. Just go."

I would rather have him ignore me forever than hate me and pity me.

He turned around reluctantly and began to walk away.

And that's when I blacked out.

Annabeth POV

I couldn't stand being at my cabin; I couldn't stand him knocking on the door.

So after sneaking out of the back window, I ran over to the lake, one of the only places I could think at.

I sat down sighing, looking at my reflection.  
Was I ugly? I took my hair out of its pony-tail and letting it shower down around my face.

No, it couldn't be that, I was fairly pretty…

Am I annoying? Sigh…

I placed my head on my hands, letting loose a few tears.

I found it soothing to swish my feet in the water, making circles… the peacefulness… birds softly chirping…

"Annabeth!" an all too familiar voice yelled.

I tensed and shot my head in his direction.

Standing less than thirty feet away was Percy, a relieved expression on his face.

My eyes widened and as I was about to run, something grabbed my ankles and started to pull me into the water.

I screamed, as Percy tried to grab my hand, but failed. I was pulled under water, falling unconscious slowly…

Thalia POV

This was the best day of my life… not.

I cannot believe he forgot my birthday! Does he even care?

I sighed. Why did this have to happen to me? Maybe I should have stayed in the hunt...

But then I wouldn't have been able to see my friends. I sighed again, turning over in my bunk.

I wish I could just escape all of this madness, I would have nothing to stress about… that sounded nice.

Getting a sleepy feeling, I pulled the covers over my head, snuggling into the nice fabric, drifting off to sleep.

Lou Ellen POV

How could he say that?

I wasn't proud of my decision to help Kronos, but try looking at it from my point of view. My mother was neglected as a goddess. She didn't have a throne, wasn't invited to the meetings, so you could see why she'd be a tad bitter.

And well, she was my mother. I didn't understand which side would be the _right_ side to go on. Was there even a right side? It would be the same general concept if a daughter of Khoine had gone to Gaia's side in the Giant War.

So anyways, I kept running through the woods.

Suddenly, my foot got caught in something and the world flipped upside down. Or maybe that was just me…

I recognized the trap as one of the Stolls annoying pranks.

"Stoll!" I screamed, as tears started welling up in my eyes. I'd had way too much today. All I wanted to do was lie down in my warm bed and just go to sleep.

I felt the rope go slack and I fell hard on the ground on my back. My mind began to go fuzzy, and then everything went black.

Katie POV

I ran to the strawberry fields, hot tears falling down my face.

I hated Travis. I freaking _hated_ him. And I never hated anyone.

He was such a jerk!

I kept running, past the fields, into a little clearing. Nobody knew about it, it was like my secret safe place to go to when I just needed to get away. The only ones who knew were McKenna, Seph, and Skylar. They had found me here one day after I ran away crying after Travis poured syrup onto me.

I sat down against a tree. The breeze was soft, blowing my hair away from my face.

Maybe I should just leave camp. All they knew me as was the bossy, uptight daughter of Demeter.

And to make things even better, I was in love with my best friend's half brother.

Also known as the one who hates me and thinks everything would be better if I was gone.

Also known as Travis Stoll.

On that happy note, I fell asleep, listening to the wind hum through the trees.

Hazel POV

I ran out of the Ares/Mars cabin, tears streaming out of my eyes.

I'd never felt such pain. And that was coming from the girl whose mother was possessed by an insane earth goddess.

I made a b-line for the Hades/Pluto cabin. As soon as I got there, I busted through the door, pushed past Nico, who was staring at the door in utter shock, and landed face down on my bunk. I thought about what Frank said, did he really think that I was only with him was because I felt bad for him? Was I really that bad of a girlfriend?

I heard the door open, Nico probably didn't want to be in here with me like this, and I don't blame him. No one would want to be around someone as horrible as me. I just can't believe that Frank would ever think that, he was my best friend as well as my boyfriend; I was with him because I loved him.

I saw darkness outside. I must have been in there longer than I thought. I curled up in a ball, wanting to be as far away from Frank as possible.

I couldn't stand it, I had to get away. I got up, and ran outside, and saw that it was still pretty light out; there must have been a shadow on the cabin.

I took off and ran into the forest, away from the camp, and hopefully away from my worries. After a few minutes, I figured out that I was hopelessly lost, but I didn't really care. I sat against the nearest tree and cried. I don't know what happened, all I knew was that I was falling apart. Frank was everything to me! I was so close to him and he was my only friend for so long, and he went and accused me of doing all that!

I needed a break and something was pulling me under, begging me sleep, and that was what I needed, I needed a good night's sleep, maybe in the morning, I could figure some way to fix all of this. Slowly I felt myself falling under a heavy veil of unconsciousness.

**AN: Ta daa! What do you guys think? Review! Love ya!**

**~Nessa, Kayla, McKenna**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: Did you miss us? We're back with another chapter! :D**

**Disclaimer: We don't own PJO or HoO**

Will POV

I am an idiot.

That was the only thought going through my head. I am an idiot.

Why the Hades did I say that to Skylar?

I wasn't even paying attention to what I was saying. All I was worried about was my bow and arrow. After she'd started laughing, I'd just assumed it was her and I hadn't really realized what I was about to say until I did.

Her beautiful blue eyes had started to water up and it was _me_ who did that to her.

I tried to fix it, but she never gave me the chance. Her last words to me stung the most.

_I thought that you of all people knew me better than that._

I _did_ know her better than that, but I was just being an ass.

So she just ran out of my cabin. I knew it was up to me to fix this.

As I was running out, I ran into my half sister, Hannah.

"Hey. I was just looking for you. Thanks for letting me borrow your bow and arrow. The Hephaestus cabin said they would fix mine by tomorrow." She said, holding out my missing bow and arrow.

Crap. I remembered now. I told her she could use it.

"Uh, put it on my bed. I have to go and take care of something else right now." I said, walking away.

She put her hand on my shoulder. "Is that something more important than your bow and arrow?" She asked, eyebrows raised.

Hannah as well as the rest of my cabin knew how important my bow and arrow were to me. Not all demigods got gifts from their parents, so this mattered a lot.

I looked her in the eye. "Yes, more important than anything in the world."

She looked shocked. But then she let go of me and said, "Ok, go get her."

I didn't even have to ask how she knew this was about Skylar. She was an Aphrodite child at heart.

I nodded and started walking to the places she might be at. Knowing my girlfriend, if she even _was_ my girlfriend anymore, she would either be at her cabin, with Seph and McKenna, or… the beach!

I ran over to the beach. She wasn't there.

I stared out at the waves crashing along the shore. I loved this place. I'd finally told her how I felt here, at 2 in the morning.

I sighed and turned around.

There she was, standing and staring at me.

I felt my heart break in two as I looked at her. Her eyes were red and puffy, and there were tear tracks on her cheeks.

"Skylar…" I said softly.

Tears started welling up in her eyes again as she turned and ran towards the woods.

I ran after her, I couldn't lose her. She meant everything to me.

I kept yelling her name, but if she heard me, she showed no signs of it.

I kept running through the trees, trying to find her. I had no clue where I was going, but I had to find her if it was the last thing I did. And knowing the life of a demigod, it might as well be just that.

Suddenly, I heard a sound that made my blood run cold. The worst sound in the world, Skylar's scream.

I sprinted over to where I heard it. I looked around frantically but I couldn't see her.

I heard her laugh behind me and I spun around. Instead of Skylar though, I saw a pink shimmering note on the ground.

I walked over and picked it up, hoping it would give me a clue as to what happened.

_Dear Will,_

_In case you haven't already figured this out, this is Aphrodite. I'm sorry, but you're a little bit too late. I have Skylar, as well as the others. Now you're probably wondering what I'm planning (don't lie, I can read your mind). Well, you broke her heart. Now you have to find her, and hope she forgives you. Go and find the others and then I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite_

I stared at the paper in my hand.

Gods, I am an idiot.

Percy POV

"ANNABETH!" I yelled, running towards the spot where she was abducted.

My eyes scanned the water, looking for her. But all I found was a pink note, sitting idly on the surface of the water.

I grabbed it up to read it.

_Dear Percy,_

_In case you haven't already figured this out, this is Aphrodite. I'm sorry, but you're a little bit too late. I have Annabeth, as well as the others. So, while you're going to be going on a wild goose chase to look for her, she'll be having some girl time with her friends. Now you have to find her, and hope she forgives you. Go and find the others and then I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite._

Damn… I really fucked up this time.

Leo POV

I went over to my cabin after Reyna had kicked me out of her cabin.

Of course, the moment I got there, Nyssa started reprimanding me for what I said to Reyna. She told me to either go fix it, or to never step foot in the cabin again. Even if I was technically the counselor of the cabin, she could be pretty damn scary when she wanted to be.

So I went back to see if she was still there, but she wasn't. I walked around camp looking for her, when I heard of a fiasco at the arena.

I smiled. Reyna.

I ran over to the arena.

A crowd had formed around Reyna, watching her tear apart everything in sight.

"What're you looking at?" she snarled, and they all backed away and started doing their own thing. Except for me that is.

Her hand clenched tight around her sword and she looked around. Finding nothing, she chucked the sword at a wall. It lodged itself nicely there, and everybody left the arena all together.

I smiled sadly at her. "Hey Rey."

She turned to me, her eyes blazing with fury. "Do _not_ call me that, Valdez." She warned, threateningly.

I felt my eyes turn steel cold. "Or what _Rey_? What are you going to do? I came here to apologize for before, but you know, maybe I won't."

She looked at me. "Then don't." She said softly. "My dad didn't either. He just left us."

I stared at her. Shock was written all over my face.

She slumped down against the wall. "Just leave. Please. Just go."

But I didn't want to. I don't know what the feeling was bubbling around inside of me, but it was stronger than anything I'd ever felt before. I couldn't leave her.

But seeing her eyes, so full of pain and sadness, I knew I had to. For her.

I turned around reluctantly and began to walk away.

The feeling only got heavier.

"Rey…" I began, turning back around. I froze. She wasn't there. She had been there like two seconds ago… where did she go?

Instead, there was a pink slip of paper where she had been sitting. I walked over and picked it up.

_Dear Leo,_

_In case you didn't know already, this is Aphrodite. I'm sorry, but you're a little bit too late. I have Reyna, as well as the others. The thing is, she's heartbroken. You should know already that Reyna never cries. But that's what you made her do… Now you have to find her, and hope she forgives you. Go and find the others and then I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite_

Oh shit. Love?

Connor POV

Gods, I have no clue why the Hades I said that…

Oh, why the Hades did I say that!?

I stopped internally fighting with myself after seeing some of the weird looks people were giving me. I sprinted off in the direction I saw Lou Ellen go.

I ran into the forest, completely ignoring the fact that they were filled with monsters and traps and I had no weapons or backup.

After looked around frantically, shouting her name.

After a few minutes of nothing, I leaned back against a tree and put my head in my hands.

Suddenly, I heard a shout. "Stoll!" My head snapped up. That was Lou Ellen!

I jumped up and dashed over to where I heard her shout.

Looking around, I saw nothing except for a bunch of trees, dirt, a glittery pink note, a few bushes-

Wait.

My head turned back to the glittery pink note.

I ran over and picked it up. Maybe this would tell me where Lou Ellen was. My eyes scanned over the paper.

_Dear Connor,_

_This is Aphrodite and the gods (but mainly Aphrodite). Anyways, I've got Lou Ellen and the others hidden away. Long story short, you have to find her, and hope she forgives you. That comment you made was quite snarky. So anyways, go and find the others, and I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite._

Oh damn.

Travis POV

I have no clue why I did that.

After Skylar left the cabin, after surprisingly not slapping me, I crashed back onto my bed.

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't backing out. I mean, this was Katie freaking Gardner.

Also known as the girl I've been in love with ever since I saw her when we were seven. And after all these years, she still thought of me as the annoying boy who pranked her and teased her… even though that was what I did.

Ahhhh! Screw this. I'll do what I do best. I'll wing it.

Knowing Katie, she'd probably go to her safe place, the little clearing past the strawberry fields.

Of course, she didn't know that I knew about that…

I'd been stalking… I mean, watching her out of plain curiosity… yea. So I was watching her out of plain curiosity one day, and I saw her sneak off in the direction of the fields.

Now normally I wouldn't think of it as that big of a deal, considering she was a daughter of Demeter, but she had specifically made sure nobody saw her.

But I did. So I followed her to the place and watched her as she sat down against a tree. A few tears fell down her face, and my heart broke.

This happened 3 years ago. Before then, I thought it was just an everlasting crush I had on Katie, but at that moment, I knew it. I knew that I loved Katie Gardner.

I ran towards the spot, and slowed down the last few steps. I peered through the strawberry plants and looked for her. But she wasn't there.

I sighed and turned back around.

I heard Katie laugh behind me and I spun around. Instead of Katie though, I saw a bright pink note against the tree.

I walked over and picked it up.

_Dear Travis,_

_As you probably already know from the pinkness of this note, this is Aphrodite. I'm sorry, but you're too late. I have Katie and the others hidden away. You're going to have to find her. Go and get the others, and then I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite_

Gods, I was going to hurt those freaking meddling Olympians. But first things first.

Find Katie.

James POV

Well, there were many words for how I felt.

And to be honest, none of them were even _close_ to being strong enough. I was being an insensitive bastard, and a complete dumbass. I let my mouth run and say terrible things about her, _then_ I go and let her leave… just go, and stand there like… well a _dumbass_.

McKenna slapped me and that sent a feeling of sharp reality through me. I'd just hurt the one girl that I'd ever been truly crazy about, and the one person that I'd ever truly cared about, and then let her run away! So I did what any good boyfriend would do: I ran after her.

One slight problem: Seph could breathe under water, and I couldn't, so you do the math and tell me where she was headed.

After feeling a nasty tremor under my feet, I saw McKenna dive underwater, and I figured that she would get her to come back to her cabin… that would be where I was, on my knees begging for her to forgive me for being an idiot.

The very thought revolted me… I was a son of Jupiter after all, but Seph was _everything_ to me, I couldn't lose her!

Just the thought of having her hate me for a second longer, made me dash to her cabin, and just in time to see McKenna run in, tears streaming out of red eyes.

Figuring that two upset girls were too much for me to handle by myself, especially considering that both of them are ticked off at me, I leaned against a tree waiting for Seph to walk out… she was never one to stay in her room and cry.

Sure enough, about ten minutes later (which felt like ten hours, thanks to ADHD) she walked out, and I thought one thing that a guy should _never_ tell his girlfriend: she looked awful! A cold feeling of guilt squeezed at my heart.

She looked at me for a moment, before snapping her head forward and marching off, not so much as acknowledging me. I wanted to march up to the person that put her through this and cause them the most pain that they'd ever witnessed, but I couldn't because I don't think that there is more pain than watching her being hurt and upset. I sighed, and didn't try to follow; I knew that would be a bad move.

A few minutes later, I decided that I _had_ to talk to her, if I didn't it would be bad for my own mental health. Removing myself from the tree, I marched toward the one spot that I was sure to find her.

While I was walking, I let myself think about how she was bound to scream at me, and demand that I leave her alone, not that I would, I was filled with the same amount of resolve that I had the first time I kissed her, _that_ was saying a lot.

I'd made it to the forest, and walking around distracted and alone was not a good tactic for staying alive, but I couldn't help it. Every time I thought of a monster attacking her, or her sitting down and sobbing, I put on an extra spurt of speed.

When I was about ten feet from the clearing, I heard her… she was singing the song that I sang to her after our last battle in the forest. I ran as fast as I could, reaching the clearing by Zeus' fist in record time.

One slight problem: Seph was nowhere to be found, I looked all over, even took to the air a couple of times. And just when I was on the edge of flipping out, I saw something glowing dull pink. I ran over to it, and saw that it was a sheet of paper. Snatching it up, I managed to decipher it. It said:

_Dear James,_

_In case you haven't figured it out, this is Aphrodite. Sorry sweetie, but you're a little late. I have Persephone as well as the others. You're probably wondering what I'm up to. You seriously hurt her (though I imagine that you knew that), and now it's up to you to find her and hope that she's still in love with you and ready to forgive you. Go and find the others and I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite._

What the Hell had I done?

And that was when I started flipping out.

Jason POV

Wow, I was a major idiot! Had I just accused her of cheating on me? Piper was the best person that I knew, why would she want to. And she just walked, not that I could blame her, oh gods!

I was still for all of ten seconds before I set off. I didn't know how, but I was going to explain, and hopefully by some miracle, she was going to take me back. I don't know _how_ long I searched, racking my brain for possible spots that she could be. I remembered a few people yelling, but none of them were Piper. I was about to give up and go and beg one of her friends to spill the information, when it hit me. I knew exactly where she was.

I walked with a purpose to the clearing where we first kissed. As much as she hated it, she did have an Aphrodite side to her. When the part of the forest came into view, I started to sprint, figuring that the sooner that I found her and begged for forgiveness, the better.

When I got to the clearing, there was no one there. I looked all around, knowing that she would have went there, I'd never been so sure about something. But as I was looking, I realized that she wasn't there. A feeling of hopelessness settled in. I would have probably screamed out in pure utter despair if I wouldn't have seen the pink note.

I picked it up, and quickly read through it.

_Dear Jason,_

_I thought that you should know that this is Aphrodite. I have my daughter as well as the other girls. Don't worry they're safe, your love life is the object that is in jeopardy. You really did hurt her, and she's really angry (I'm pretty sure that wasn't news to you). It's your job to find her and hope that she is in love with you enough to take you back. Go and find the others, and I will give you your first clue!_

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly, _

_Aphrodite._

Frank POV

I grabbed my jacket, I had to find Hazel and hope against hope that she would decide to forgive me. Out of habit I patted my chest, and with a sinking feeling, I felt a small lump. Oh gods.

"HAZEL!" I shouted, running out of the cabin, the people within hearing distance, turned to look at me, but I didn't pay them any attention. With a start, I saw gems that were sticking out of the ground. Guess she wouldn't be that hard to find after all.

I took off at full speed, refusing to stop until I found her. She'd ran pretty far into the forest, if it hadn't been for the jewels, I would have gotten lost and been eaten by monsters. I'd have to thank her for that if she didn't try to drown me in priceless gems when I found her.

I was considering turning into something smaller, that way I could fit through the narrow trees better, but it turned out I didn't need to. The trail of jewels stopped abruptly at a large tree. But there was no Hazel at the end, instead there was a note.

_Dear Frank,_

_Accusing her of stealing your stick, tsk, tsk. I would have thought better of you! But I'm not here for scolding. I have Hazel, and not to worry, she is completely safe! You need to find her and hope that she forgives you. Go to the others and I will give you your first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite._

What had I done?

Zach POV

"STUPID!" I shouted, adding another hole to my wall. How in the world could that have happened? I should've known. Lindsay _hated_ McKenna. No wonder she came and talked to me out of nowhere.

I had no intention of hurting McKenna. Not one bit.

Falling onto my bed, I felt paper crumple under me, and I jerked up. Lifting the covers, a pink note caught my eye.

Grabbing the note, I scanned through the cursive writing, my eyes widening.

_Dear Zachary,_

_In case you haven't already figured this out, this is Aphrodite. I'm sorry, but you're a little bit too late. I have McKenna, as well as the others. Now you're probably wondering what I'm planning (don't lie, I can read your mind). Well, you broke her heart. Now you have to find her, and hope she forgives you. Go and find the others and then I'll give you the first clue._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite_

Shit.

Nico POV

What did I do? How could I have been so stupid?

Forgetting her _birthday_, shit.

I actually had remembered, and I'd even gotten her a gift, but I wasn't exactly the sharpest person after being woken up.

She probably thought I took her for granted now. But I didn't. I didn't know why in the world she would ever go out with me of all people, but she did. I was the luckiest guy in the world, and I just ruined that.

Well sitting around wasn't going to help anything. I got up and walked out the door.

I did a loop of the entire camp, growing more and more frantic by the minute. The last place I checked was her cabin.

Crossing my fingers, I walked in hoping to see my girlfriend hopefully throwing something at the wall or blasting Green Day.

Instead, I saw messy bed sheets, teardrops on her pillow, and a pink glittery note.

Which one seemed out of place? Oh yeah, the note. Quickly grabbing it, I scanned over the writing.

_Dear Nico,_

_This is Aphrodite in case you didn't know. I have Thalia and the other girls. Now you should know that she is one word right now: broken. Her own family never cared (except for her brother that she thought was dead), and now her boyfriend forgot her birthday? Not ok. So go find the others if you want your girlfriend back._

_Love will lead the way._

_Yours truly,_

_Aphrodite_

I crumbled up the paper in my hands and threw it at the wall. I slid down against the wall next to her bed and put my head in my hands.

What had I done?

**AN: Ok, so I can already tell you that the next update will be next weekend :) It'll prob be an update per week now that school's up and running. Thank you for all the reviews! They mean the world! :D**

**~McKenna, Nessa, Kayla**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: It is finally starting to get to the real story! So each chapter will have one couple's POVs :)**

**PLEASE READ: So I changed the chapter organization for the story. All of the fights are in chapter 1. The gods are chapter 2. All of the kidnappings are in chapter 3. All of the guys finding out are in chapter 4. None of the actual story has been changed, but just letting you know.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Zach POV

"McKenna!" I shouted, running barefoot to the Poseidon cabin.

Oh please no, please no, please no!

Bursting through the door, my heart rose up into my throat. She was gone.

Tissues were scattered the ground everywhere and her bunk was empty.

"Percy! James!" I called out, dashing out the door. "Will! Jason! Nico!- Oof!"

Percy slammed into me, nearly knocking the both of us over.

Nico, Will, Jason, James, Frank, Leo, and the Stolls ran up to us, all of them looking worried.

We all looked at each other for a split second before shouting, "We have to find (insert girl's name here)!" all at the same time.

Normally, if this happened, we would all be on the ground laughing, but there was absolutely nothing funny about this.

"You got the letters?" Jason asked us.

We nodded and looked at each other. Did all of us manage to break a girl's heart today!?

"Do any of you know what it means when it says 'love will lead the way'?" Percy asked.

"No clue," Will replied.

"Oh gods, how are we supposed to do this?" James asked.

We all looked around in hope of finding another one of those pink notes.

The wind picked up suddenly and Connor said, "Hey! What happen- oh. Yeah, pink note."

I took it from his hand and looked at the fancy cursive handwriting. "Go to Thalia's pine tree." I read.

"Wow. These clues are actually really easy." Percy commented.

"Way to jinx it, idiot." Nico said under his breath.

"Whatever. Let's go." James urged.

We sprinted up the hill to the tree. Lying around it were ten backpacks with our names on a label. Inside of mine, there was nectar and ambrosia, some medical supplies, a roll of mortal money and drachmas, and… and a picture of me and McKenna. It was of our first kiss. I don't know how that got in there, but looking at it just made me more motivated.

A pink note was attached to the tree.

Travis ripped it off and read it out loud.

_A glittery flower, a fall off a cliff,_

_You left this girl feeling very miffed._

_Burning through her soul was an ice cold pain,_

_Which dissolved into the night like a drop of rain._

On the last word, there was a flash. All of us looked like normal teenagers, with t-shirts, jeans, and sneakers.

"Well thanks for jinxing it Percy." Nico spoke through the silence.

Percy rolled his eyes but didn't say anything.

"What are we going to do now?" Connor complained.

Percy spoke up. "We have to try to decipher it. It's like a prophecy, not clear at first but it makes sense afterwards…"

"Wow, Annabeth's been rubbing off on you." Frank commented.

"Yes. And she will continue to because we _will_ find her and the others." Percy replied firmly.

"But don't prophecies tell what will happen? This is hinting to a location." James said.

I groaned. "This is going to take forever."

"But it doesn't matter. We have to find the girls." Nico said. "Now think about where it could be."

A fall off a cliff, a glittery flower, ice cold pain. What was that supposed to mean?

Just when I was about to give up, Will's eyes widened and he said, "I know where it is."

McKenna POV

My head was fuzzy, almost as if a cloud was covering up an important detail…

I turned over and wrapped the warm blanket around me into a cocoon. Too lazy to get up, I snuggled further into the tug, getting comfortable. Now something really was unsettling…

It finally hit me: My cabin didn't have any carpeting.

My eyes snapped open and I jumped up off of the floor, my sword already in my hand.

Panic swept through me. Where was I? How was I here? Who was here?

Cautiously, I analyzed the room. There were glass doors, which seemed to be locked, a wooden TV cabinet, two couches, including a weird egg like seat, a glass coffee table, two bookshelves, and a window seat.

From where I was standing, I could see the beach. And instead of feeling safe… I felt terrified.

A sickening feeling swept through my body as I came closer to the window. I recognized the beach, the way the waves crashed along the shore-

The door creaked and I jumped, my heart thumping loudly.

I whipped around, and my vision blurred.

"McKenna!" I heard two familiar voices say. I saw blurs of pink and blue rushing towards me.

"S-seph… S-skylar…"

My sword clattered to the ground as I doubled over, blackness covering my vision.

I got a sinking feeling that I'd been here before, and was going to take a miracle to get out.

**AN: So sorry about the wait! And about the length. Hope you enjoyed the chapter!**

**~Nessa, Kayla, McKenna**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: Thank you for the reviews! This is Will and Skylar's POVs.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Will POV

"Where!?" all of the guys shouted at once.

I sighed. "Mount Diablo."

The clue made perfect sense.

When I received questioning glances, I started to explain. "Um… Skylar and I went there last winter on a quest to heal the Golden Fleece. We kinda fell off a cliff when I saved her from a giant. Then Khione stabbed her with one of her poisonous icicles. So… yea, we have to go to Mount Diablo."

"Ok. So how are we supposed to get there?" James asked.

"I haven't thought of that yet." I said.

"Well, Aphrodite probably has the help of the other gods in this messed up plan. So she's most likely convinced Zeus not to blow Percy, Nico, Zach and Frank out of the sky if we go on a plane." Connor said.

"It's risky, but what other choice do we have?" Leo sighed.

The four of them who were mentioned looked terrified, but slowly nodded.

"Come on, let's go hotwire a van." Travis said, with a slight gleam in his eyes. That didn't exactly reassure me, but I had learned to trust the Stolls when it came to something like this.

Luckily for us, the camp van was unguarded at the time. Argus had just come back from driving in the city; he had been on official Delphi Strawberry business. He left the van out while he went to go and check on something with Chiron.

The Stolls quickly got started and we had a running engine within a few minutes. Percy volunteered to drive since he had had the most experience driving in the real world.

As we drove into the city, it was silent. None of us were in the mood for talking. There were too many regrets and questions at the moment.

Where had Aphrodite taken the girls? That was number one.

We abandoned the van somewhere near the airport and walked the rest of the way. I went to get the tickets.

"Hello, how may I help you?" said the attendant.

"Um, I'd like ten tickets to San Francisco." I said.

Praying silently, I put my hand in my bag and felt pieces of paper. Thank the gods.

I gave them to her, with our passports, which I had conveniently found in my bag.

Soon enough, we were on the plane. Some of the guys decided to get some sleep, which was pretty smart, considering it might be the last chance we had in days.

I closed my eyes, but thoughts kept getting in the way. Mainly about me and Skylar. What would happen if we didn't get to her and the others in time? I couldn't bear it if anything happened to her.

Why did I say what I did to her? All I knew was that if Aphrodite's plan didn't work, I would be losing the one thing that mattered more to me than anything else ever would.

Sighing, I managed to fall asleep. Thoughts and sounds of waves crashing along a sunny shore filled my mind. It kept growing louder and louder, until it came to a sudden stop.

I felt someone shaking my shoulders. "Will, come on man. We're here." Said Travis.

I slung my backpack over my shoulder and walked down the aisle to the exit.

The flight attendants were smiling around at everyone and saying things like, "Have a nice day." or "Hope you enjoyed the flight."

I was the last one to leave the plane from our group. A flight attendant who looked much older than the rest smiled creepily at me and said, "I hope to see you again."

I shuddered and speed walked to where the others were waiting. I still couldn't get that creepy feeling out of my head.

James nodded at me. "We should get going. It's going to take a while to get to Mount Diablo."

I nodded. "The quicker we get there, the quicker we find the girls."

"We all want to be reunited with our girlfriends." Nico agreed, sighing.

Travis, Connor, and Leo squirmed uncomfortably at the word "girlfriend." They weren't actually going out with Katie, Lou Ellen, and Reyna. But it was no secret that they all had massive crushes on the three.

Jason frowned. "As much as I don't want to go back there after last year, let's head to Mount Diablo."

"Hopefully Enchilada won't be there this time." Leo muttered. I gave him a weird look, but Jason nodded, completely serious.

I could see the tip of the mountain, and we began going in that direction. We walked a few miles without any trouble. Except for the constant complaints.

"I'm tired!" whined Connor, for about the 100th time.

I rolled my eyes. "Nice to know. I didn't exactly understand what you meant the first ninety times."

"Can we get on a bus or something? I'd like to get there before dark, and it wouldn't be smart to arrive exhausted because we walked." Zach said.

"I second that." James said, raising a hand.

I sighed. "You're right. Let's go."

"There's a stop." Connor said, pointing to a tall sign that read _Bsu Tspo._ I was guessing it probably said _Bus Stop_.

We walked over and I sat on one of the benches. I pulled a map I got at the airport out of my bag and looked at it.

Feeling dizzy, I handed it to Frank. "You're the only non dyslexic one of us. Please tell me you can read this."

He nodded and looked over it.

We waited for about half an hour. Just as I was about to suggest we leave, the bus pulled up with a silent brake. It was already beginning to get dark, so we rushed onto the bus, not paying attention to that.

I looked at the driver as I was getting on and got an eerie feeling that I'd seen her before, but I couldn't put my finger on it.

"Dude, go." Zach said from behind me.

I hadn't realized I'd stopped. I continued on and got one of the seats in the front, with a good view of the driver. If something happened, I'd have the best angle to attack. Something just told me we were in for a night.

The bus slowly pulled away from the stop and began to drive away from the mountain.

"Um… we're going the wrong-" Frank started, getting up.

"Silence! I will not allow this intolerance on _my_ bus! Now sit down!" the driver snarled at him.

My eyes widened as I realized where I'd heard that voice before… the flight attendant… _I hope to see you again_, she'd said.

I looked at James, who was talking to Leo about something. I continued to stare at him until he finally noticed me and looked over. I widened my eyes, and he got the silent message. He gave a slight nod, and whispered something to Leo.

I sat there silently for a while, waiting until it was safe to attack, without accidently tipping the bus over or anything.

We pulled up a block or two from the mountain and I put my hand on my sword, keeping it ready.

I stood up and faced the others, who were putting their iPods and stuff in their backpacks. "Let's go, we don't have that much time."

I turned around and jumped. The driver was less than two inches away from me.

"You're not going anywhere, darling." She snarled, before turning into a… dracanae. Shit.

The overhead compartments opened up and nine more dracanae jumped out at us. We crawled back onto the seats as they stood in the aisle, glaring at us. I got out my sword and slammed the hilt of it into the window, shattering it. The others followed my example and we jumped out into the cold night air.

Not a second too soon. The bus went up in flames as soon as we left. "Sorry!" Leo called. I rolled my eyes.

"Run!" Zach cried, as the dracanae jumped out of the flaming bus and charged at us.

I ran for a good ten meters, before turning around to find the dracanae hot on my trail, sword in hand. We parried for a few minutes before it began to get serious.

She swiped across my chest and left a good sized cut. I winced. I had to end this, or else we would never find the clue. I faked right with my sword, then brought it around from the left. Jabbing it into the dracanae's ribcage, she dissolved into dust.

The others had almost defeated the rest of the monsters. But I could see more approaching from the remains of the destroyed bus.

"Let's go! There's too many!" I yelled above the noise.

They nodded.

I ran up the mountain, the others right behind me. I could feel burning pain going through my lungs, and my legs ached. I emerged onto the top of the mountain and collapsed on the ground.

I heard a small voice inside my head, Skylar's voice. It was counting down from ten. At three, I looked over to the place where we'd found the flower last winter. A pink note was in its place, but it was slowly fading. My eyes widened and I stumbled up and ran to it. I grabbed the paper and snatched it up just as the count got to zero.

The paper rematerialized and I sighed. That was close. The others ran up to me and stared at me expectantly. I looked down and began to read.

_The edge of a platform, just because,_

_You didn't know who she was._

_Seconds away from the end,_

_Wind never makes a good friend._

Skylar POV

Gods, was I tired.

I rolled over onto my side and fell with a thud. My eyes snapped open.

Well, this was _not_ camp…

I was in what seemed to be the living room of a beach house. Eight other girls were there too, passed out on either the couches or bean bags.

Seph began to stir in her sleep. Her eyes opened and she glanced around at the room before looking at me. "Where in Hades are we?"

I shrugged. "I don't know, but it sure seems better than the Underworld."

She cracked a smile. "I suppose…"

It fell into silence after that.

The beach house seemed calm, a little too calm. Something felt weird, besides the fact that all of us just happened to show up here.

I spoke up. "Seriously, where are we? I'm getting freaked out…"

Suddenly there was a loud thump upstairs. Seph and I looked at each other with wide eyes for a moment before running to the stairs and making our way up.

We came to a closed door.

"I _know_ it came from behind here." I whispered frantically.

"Ok, open on the count of three." Seph whispered back.

"One…" I counted.

"Two…"

"Three!"

I opened the door slowly with a creak, my knife in my hand already. McKenna was standing inside with her back to us, staring out at the ocean through a glass door.

She spun around and began to look woozy.

"McKenna!" Seph and I yelled, rushing towards her.

"S-seph… S-skylar…" she mumbled.

Her sword clattered to the ground and she doubled over, falling to the floor.

I shook her by the shoulders. "Kenna, wake up!"

Seph looked at me with wide eyes. "Quick, get her on the bed."

We carried her to the king sized bed and laid her down.

"She'll be fine for now, let's go down." Seph said.

"Ok, let's see if the others are awake." I replied.

Sure enough, they were. There were quite a few of us here. Me, Seph, Mckenna, and Katie, Lou Ellen, Annabeth, Thalia, Piper, Reyna, and Hazel.

They turned to look at us. "Where are we?" Katie asked.

I pursed my lips. "I'm not sure, but I think McKenna knows. She's passed out right now, so we'll have to wait until she wakes up."

"Guys, I'm starting to freak…" Piper said, "This isn't normal."

"Is this some kind of prison for demigods? They have ambrosia and nectar in the cabinets, all of us are demigods, and the TV says _Ήφαιστος_ on it, it means Hephaestus!" Thalia asked.

"I don't think so, it's far too luxurious to be a prison. Unless whoever put us here is trying to toy with our minds, in which case, it's working." Annabeth said, glancing around, trying to take everything in.

I walked over to the glass doors leading to the beach and tugged on the handles, but they wouldn't budge.

We were stuck here, and we weren't going to be getting out any time soon.

**AN: The girl's outfits are on Polyvore. The link's on McKenna's profile. And also, for some of you, reviews won't show because of the new chapter arrangement. But it'll go back to normal next chapter. Shoutouts next chapter to anyone who can tell us where the guys are going next :)**

**~Nessa, Kayla, McKenna**


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Jason POV

I _knew_ the hint was meant for me. "Guys," I said, "we need to get to the Grand Canyon."

They all looked at me like I was psycho; all of them but Leo, who nodded. "That makes sense. This is about when Dylan blew Piper off the tower when we first met."

"Exactly," I agreed.

"You're sure?" Travis said.

"Positive," I said, "how to get there?"

"No sense going by airplane," Zach said, "we're only a state away."

"I have an idea," Travis announced, rubbing his hands together.

Twenty minutes later we were all sitting in a van that Travis and Connor "borrowed" from some local ware house, and we were well on our way.

The hours passed by in silence. Everyone was tense and lost in thought. I was thinking about the look on Piper's face before she walked away; it had the same degree of anger that she normally reserved for Drew.

Sighing, I brought myself out of my depressing thoughts and looked out the window. It was well past dark and the streets passed by in a blur; James drove like a maniac.

"How much further?" I asked breaking the hour long silence.

"Not too far," Travis called from the passenger seat in the front, his nose stuck in a map.

Percy was sitting beside me in the van, his head in his hands. He was taking it the hardest out of all of us, and that was saying a lot. He would go through periods of being an upbeat leader to being passive and depressed. It was as if he'd forgotten what was wrong and thought Annabeth was on a quest with him, just to go back and remember what happened all over again.

Frank was on the other side of me. He took to looking at a golden wristwatch, as if looking at the precious metal would bring Hazel back and alleviate all of his worries.

Zach had something on his hand that he was looking at. In the dim light that was coming off the moon, I could tell that it was a picture.

Will and Connor both seemed to have gone into a silence of sorts, staring off into space, not seeing much of anything. They were probably thinking of a way out of their current predicament, thinking back to a happy memory of Skylar or Lou Ellen, or trying to decide what they were going to tell them once we found them.

Nico seemed to be beating himself up over what he did, murmuring "stupid" under his breath ever few minutes.

Travis and James seemed to have thrown themselves into the quest, not thinking about who they'd lost. Travis hated showing any kind of emotion other than humor (went against the Hermes code). And I think James was afraid of going insane again… when he found out Seph was really gone, it shook him up.

Everyone seemed to have their coping strategy, everyone but me. I was internally freaking out and I knew that there was a good chance that Piper wouldn't ever want to talk to me again, let alone be my girlfriend. That was the same for the rest of them, so why was I the only one that felt this way?

'No,' I decided, 'we ALL feel like this, we're all just too good at hiding it.' After making that discovery, it dawned on me just how tired I really was. Deciding that a van full of guys who were fully armed and trained for battle was a safe spot to fall asleep, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, immediately drifting off into an uneasy sleep.

My dreams were filled with nightmares about Piper screaming at me that she hated me and that she wanted nothing more to do with me. She informed me that she would rather kiss a giant squid than to go out with me. I was in the middle of getting on my knees and begging her to give me a second chance (only to have her laugh at me) when I snapped back into consciousness.

It didn't take me long to figure out why I was jarred back into reality. The van was flipping across the road at top speed. We landed sideways in a huge canal ditch hard enough to knock the breath out of me.

"DAMN IT!" came James's voice from the driver's seat.

I groaned and got up.

"What the hell happened?" Leo demanded, looking at James, who was still somehow in his seat.

"I don't know," James said, getting unsteadily to his feet, and cradling his left arm to his chest. "A force like a brick wall hit us, I tried to get control but it hit us again and we started to flip. My arm hit the damn steering wheel the wrong way and it's broken. I would suggest getting weapons out."

Immediately I unsheathed my gladius, and pointed it at the back of the van. Absently I noticed that the rest of them were doing the same.

"Anyone have any ideas of what we're up against?" Connor asked, looking around.

"Yes," Nico and Zach said at the same time.

"Hellhounds," Nico murmured, "whole pack of them."

"We need to get out of this van," Percy declared, "this probably isn't the best spot to be at the moment."

"Yes," Travis snapped, "because the side of the highway in the middle of the night is so much better!"

"Not to mention that at the moment, James is about as good as an appetizer for the dogs; you can't fight all that well with a broken arm," Will informed them.

"We can't stay in here," Percy hissed. "A pack of dogs are somewhere…" For some reason he trailed off and looked at Nico, who had a thoughtful expression on his face.

"What is it?" I demanded.

"They're gone," Zach said.

"What do you mean gone?" Frank demanded. "They knocked us off the road, more than likely totaled the van and they just left?"

"That's exactly what he means," Nico said.

"You know what that means, don't you?" Frank said, "Someone put them up to this... more than likely Aphrodite."

"Guys," James sighed, "I mean I know _we're_ on the gods' side, but sometimes I wonder whose side _they're_ on."

"Gods, James," Connor said, "that's that truest thing I've heard all day."

We got out of the van and realized that it would take a miracle (or a tow truck) to get the thing out of the ditch that it was currently wedged in. After a quick inspection, Leo informed us that it was damaged beyond any quick repair that he would be able to attempt even if we managed to free of from the ditch.

"What now?" Connor demanded.

"We keep walking," I said briskly. I looked down the road and saw a sign. It said GRAND CANYON on it with huge letters and a huge arrow right under it.

"You know," Travis said, scratching the back of his head, as if thinking hard about something, "I didn't think the Grand Canyon was this close... and I also didn't know that there was a sign like that..."

"Trav…" Connor said, "dad."

"It's official," Percy exclaimed, "the power of Hermes is awesome!"

"Hey, guys," James said, "I know this is bad timing and all but how about some ambrosia?"

"Oh, sorry James!" Will said. He reached down in his package and pulled out a bag, but there was something else as well.

"How'd that get in here?" he murmured. It was a picture of Skylar leaning on him. He had his arm around her and they both seemed to be caught in mid-laugh. Will sighed wistfully before setting the picture gingerly in his pack before he stood up straight and gave a piece of ambrosia to James.

"Come on," I said, "let's get this over with."

We made it to the museum twenty minutes or so later. It was closed (like any establishment other than Walmart normally is at three o'clock in the morning).

Without so much as a word, the Stolls disabled the security system and picked the lock all in under five minutes.

"Dude," Leo said, admiration thick in his voice, "that's gotta be a record!"

"Nah," Travis said, "we've broken in so much faster than that. We were just being overly cautious, didn't really want to screw up at the moment."

"Alright," Frank said impatiently, "we can discuss their stealing habits later. Let's get the note!"

"Good idea," Nico agreed. Wordlessly, we all marched inside, and right out to the back.

When the others saw how high up it was there was a mixture of inhaling sharply and swearing. "Dear Poseidon if I didn't love Annabeth so much…" Percy muttered.

"Same with McKenna," Zach agreed.

Taking a deep breath, I opened the door and walked outside. It was still pretty dark outside, but Aphrodite's notes always seemed to glow so I figured that I would be able to see it.

But all I saw was darkness, like a blanket over my eyes; I couldn't see my hand when I waved it right in front of my face. "Guys?" I called out.

"Yeah?" Called Nico from somewhere to my right.

"Do you think it's supposed to be this dark?" I questioned.

"No," Percy said, "something's not right, my sword isn't even breaking through the darkness." I was about to answer when I heard a loud thump.

"What was that?" I demanded.

"Just me," Leo called, "I fell!"

"Try not to fall," James warned from somewhere behind me, "we won't be there to-" _Thump_.

"Alright," Travis snapped, "who fell this time?"

"I did," James said, "oh the irony."

I frowned... that really wasn't the way James normally spoke... he must have hit his head.

_Thump! Thump!_ "Ouch!" Percy and Frank yelped at the same time.

"Please be careful!" I snapped.

"What the..." Will said, "guys! Cyclopes!"

"What?" I demanded. Just as suddenly as the unnatural darkness had swallowed us, it let up. Immediately I looked around and by the light given off from the moon, I saw the silhouette of Will, Connor, Travis, Nico, and Zach. Along with five other unnatural sized blobs.

"Oh boy," Connor said.

Immediately I had my sword in hand and I stepped forward to attack. "No, no, no," a Cyclops said in a gruff voice, "you come any closer and your friends die."

I saw four of them pick up one unconscious boy each. The one was obviously a leader came closer to me. "Put down your weapons and surrender before we snap their weak little necks."

"No!" a voice sounded, it was Percy squirming, "don't even _think_ about surrendering!"

"And what would you have me do?" Connor demanded.

"Stoll," James snapped from behind Percy, "it's our fault that we're in this mess! The girls are gone and we need to get them back; they're more important than our safety!"

I looked around; all of the boys seemed to have a fierce kind of determination. I looked Percy in the eye, then Leo, then Frank, and then James. They looked back and nodded stiffly. Instead of lowering my weapon, I raised it, pointing it at the leader. "I don't think so."

The Cyclops was about to open his mouth to say something, when I heard a deep and formal voice in my mind. _Use lightning_. I was desperate and besides, who was I to mistrust a voice in my head? It seemed to know what it was talking about. Closing my eyes, I concentrated on the electricity in the air, and looked for that tugging in my gut. Finding it, I brought forth a mad torrent of electricity down from the sky. All I heard was cursing and swearing from the demigods and groans of pain from the Cyclopes as they turned to ash.

That was when I saw it. The pink note was suspended a hundred feet below the skywalk. Not bothering to say a word, I ran forward and jumped over the railing for the second time in my life and rushed down to catch the note. I heard yelling and shouting above me, which told me that I startled my friends. As soon as I grabbed the piece of paper, I stopped my free fall and I started floating back to the top.

"Grace," Nico snapped, "your sister would skin me alive if you died and at the moment, I don't really think she needs all that much of an incentive."

"Sorry, Nico," I said earnestly, "but at the moment, we got the next clue!"

I handed it to Frank who read it aloud.

_Falling, falling from fire and dust,_

_Leaving the Girl with sorrow and lust._

_After the hidden truth came out,_

_The scene exploded with a shout._

The bridge was silent for a moment before Percy spoke up. "Guys," he said excitedly, "I know where it is!"

PIPER:

"So let me get this straight," I said after we'd tried all of the exits in the house. "We're stuck in a paradise of a prison, we have no idea where we are, and to top everything off, the only person that might be able to give us a smidgen of light on the subject is currently knocked out cold?"

"Yep," Annabeth sighed, "that about sums it up."

"What should we do?" I questioned.

"Isn't it obvious?" Skylar demanded, "What do we always do in unfamiliar territory? We explore!"

"Well," I said, "I don't see why not..." I looked at Annabeth, who might have a problem with the proposal.

"Alright," she said. "Upstairs first?"

We hiked up the stairs and saw that the floor splayed in front of us was just as big as the bottom... this house was freaking huge! There were six doors lining a long hallway, three on the left, and three on the right. At the moment they had two pictures on each. There was a dove and an owl on one, a Cornucopia and a Caduceus, two tridents, a lightning bolt and a flaming torch crossed with a sword, and diamonds and a key with purple flames.

"They're our parents' symbols," Hazel muttered. "I'm going to go out on a limb and say these are our rooms."

"Alright," I said, "let's check them out?"

"Agreed," Annabeth said.

"If you need something," Lou Ellen added, "just shout."

Annabeth and I stepped toward our room and timidly I opened the door. There must have been something magical about it, the room was HUGE, and you could tell whose side was whose. Annabeth's side had two walls worth of bookshelves (architectural books) a desk and stacks of blank blueprint paper. Her bed was queen sized, there were four stark white plush pillows and the quilt on top was the same shade of grey as her eyes, and small white owls spotted across it.

My side was a bit more plain. It had dream catchers hanging from the ceiling, bean bags were on the floor and an Mp3 player was on one of them. A vanity desk sat in the corner of the room, makeup sat neatly in on the side (cue eye roll from me). My bed was a beautiful canopy bed, all of the fabric was a soft purple, and a large dove was in the center of the overlying quilt.

"Annabeth," I said, "if any of the other's rooms are like ours, this is officially the best prison I've ever dreamed of."

"Yeah really," Annabeth said, her voice thick in awe.

I walked over to the vanity desk, and saw that there was a picture. It was of Jason and me. We were both soaked from head to toe from Percy attacking us with water, we were hugging and laughing our heads off at the same time. It had to be my fondest memory with him. Gods, I wasn't going to be forgetting him anytime soon.

**AN: Thank you guys so much for getting us to a hundred reviews!**

**~Skylar, Kayla, McKenna**


	8. Chapter 8

**AN: Hehe… I'm still alive.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Percy POV

"Care to elaborate?" Will asked.

"Mount St. Helens," I replied.

"Well then, let's go!" James urged, walking to the parking lot, the others following right behind him.

I stopped him. "Um, James… you do know that we don't have any transpor-" Suddenly a RV appeared, literally from out of nowhere, two parking spaces ahead of us. "-tation… Well that problem is solved…" I finished, walking up to the RV.

I opened the door to find that it was spacious, large enough for each of us to have our own rooms plus a small dining nook, living room, and bathroom. "Dang," Leo whispered, walking around the outside of the RV a couple of times, "It's small on the outside but _huge_ on the inside! Awesome!" We entered the RV and we looked to the left to see the living space and kitchen/dining.

Travis immediately gasped and ran over to the huge flat screen TV. "Sweet, oh, _sweet_ flat screen, wonderful, magical, TV!" He then looked over at us. "Yeah… definitely not the right time…"

He walked out into the small hallway and looked at each of the 9 doors, scanning for his name, until he stopped at the second to last door, and walked into it, Frank, Leo, Will, and Connor following his example.

I was just about to sit down at the wheel, when James beat me to it, "Uh, James, I'm gonna drive this time…" I told him, motioning to move out of the seat.

"Nonsense! I drove us here; I can sure as Hades drive us to Mount St. Helens!" he protested, getting ready to buckle the seat belt.

"James, please let me drive, you need to get some rest." I insisted.

James paused, then sighed, "Fine Perce, but whenever you get tired just wake me up…"

"Deal," I said, as he got up from the seat and went back into his designated room.

I sighed and looked at the ignition and saw the key already in there ready to go. I turned the key, starting up the RV, and moving out of the parking lot. "Mount St. Helens here we come," I sighed.

_21 hours later_

Leo plopped down in the passenger seat next to me. "Percy, are we there yet?" he whined, asking the same question for the hundredth time.

I gripped the steering wheel tighter, "No, Leo, we aren't there yet! Go take a nap or something!"

Leo pondered on this for a few seconds before replying, "Nah I'll just watch TV," and with that he got up from the passenger seat and went to the back of the RV into the living room part of it and switched the TV to SpongeBob. I rolled my eyes at his childishness.

After about ten minutes of driving, my mind switched to Annabeth. Was she okay? With the way I snapped at her, she probably will never forgive me. Gods I screwed up this time…

"Yeah, you did," a godly voice replied, as if should be obvious.

"Great, now I have a god freakin annoying me!" I thought.

"You better shut your trap young man, before I obviate your sea-spawn ass!" a female voice spoke loudly in my head.

"Oh great! It's not just any Goddess, its Lady Athena…"

"I can hear your thoughts you know, but that's not the reason I am speaking to you privately, Perseus Jackson. What makes you think I'm going to let you find her?" Athena said, her voice cornering me.

My mind blanked out, only focusing on the question. She brought up the possibility that we would never find Annabeth.

"Because Lady Athena, I would never forgive myself if I didn't try to apologize to Annabeth. I wouldn't give up until I apologize for snapping at her, and I'm not going to let you stop me." I answered. This wasn't just anyone. This was Annabeth, and no god, mortal, or monster was going to stop me from finding her.

"Perseus Jackson, I will no longer stand in your way, but there are going to be many dangerous challenges you and your friends will have to overcome in order to find them."

"Then we'll overcome them," I replied confidently.

I didn't hear an answer after that, and I didn't know whether that should have worried me or not.

Finally around 30 minutes later, we made it to Mount St Helens.

"Finally!" The Stolls shouted, hopping out of the RV and onto the pavement. I almost thought that they would start to kiss the ground, but they refrained.

I lead all of the guys to up the trail inside the mountain, to the spot where Annabeth first kissed me. Thankfully, there weren't any telkhines there this time.

"Look there's the next clue!" exclaimed Travis, pointing to the glowing pink piece of paper in the distance. The problem: it was hovering in midair, right above a pot of lava.

Jason said, "I got this, guys." As he started to float towards the note, I got a sudden bad feeling in my stomach. "Holy crap!" he yelled, as a spear whizzed past him out of nowhere.

"Jason, hurry up and move!" Leo shouted.

Tumbling and twisting through the air, avoiding the various weapons being thrown at him, Jason grabbed the note and made his way back to us, rolling onto the floor of the ledge. Breathing heavily, he held it up in the air. "I got it."

"We see that. Now what does it say?" Connor asked, snatching the note from Jason's hand and reading it aloud.

_Fighting with the unnatural eyed one,_

_This was her base until you were done._

_Start of the names were double initialed,_

_Destroyed and turned into a ravenous jungle._

Annabeth POV

I slowly walked over to the bookcase and scanned each shelf, until I paused on a picture of Percy and me, sitting of the docks of the canoe lake. Slamming the face of the picture down, I walked over to my bed and plopped down onto it, hiding my face into its soft silky sheets.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Piper asked, quietly sitting down next to me, "You don't have to if you don't want to…"

"No," I replied softly, "It's fine, it's just that I feel that I'm a pawn in one of Aphrodite's love games, you know?"

"I know the feeling, unfortunately," Piper muttered, staring down at her feet.

"Hey, it'll be okay, you know Jason was just jealous." I said comfortingly.

"I know, it's just the idea that he would even _think_ that I would do something like that…"

Before I could respond, there was a knock at the door. "It's open!" I called.

Skylar appeared at the door. "Hey, make yourself comfortable here, it doesn't look like we'll be leaving soon. Anyways, we're all going to meet in the living room in half an hour to decide what the Hades is happening here and what we're going to do about it."

Piper smiled. "Alright, thanks."

Skylar closed the door and I looked at Piper, who shrugged. "I'm going to take a shower. In addition to changing my outfit, my mom decided to put makeup on me… foundation, mascara, the works. I desperately need to wash it off… now." Piper sighed, before getting up and walking over to the bathroom.

I looked around. I didn't mind the outfit that much. I guess I would take a nap; I was a bit tired anyway. I snuggled up into the warm blankets and closed my eyes, dreaming of Percy and wondering how long it would be before I got to see him again.

**AN: I swear, I will be updating much sooner this time. Sorry for the wait, hope you liked the chapter.**

**~The awesome daughters of Poseidon and Hermes**


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

Travis POV

"Unnatural eyed? What is that supposed to mean? Like cyclopes or…?" Leo questioned, trailing off.

"I don't think so. The only time we ever _fought_ with a cyclops, or at least a time that would be significant, would be with Ma Gasket. And Piper didn't have an actual base during that time." Jason said.

Percy stared off into the distance, thinking. "Well there haven't been any fights or wars with some unnatural eyed people recently. Unless you count… oh. Duh. Guys, this is about the Titan War, with Kronos. Remember, when he was being hosted by Luke, Luke's eyes were gold. If that isn't unnatural, then I don't know what is."

"Alright, but what base is the note talking about?" Nico asked. "And let's not forget the double initialed and jungle part." This was way too complicated.

We were all silent. I decided to speak up. "Well, we at least know it has to do with the Titan War. So why don't we just head back east and figure it out from there?"

No one complained, so Percy let out a shrill sharp whistle. Soon enough, a flock of pegasi flew by and landed in front of us. Percy walked up to one that was pure black and mounted it. Looking over at us, he said, "Well, come on. What are you waiting for?"

I walked over to a pegasus named Raintorn, Katie's favorite. He was different shades of blue, all close to denim, like rain. I mounted him and we flew off into the air. Looking around, I thought about how much Katie would've loved this. I had really screwed up this time. I should've just done what everyone told me to do, and told her I loved her. But being me, I had to prank her for attention.

In a matter of minutes, which I thought was kind of awesome, I saw the Empire State building. The pegasi dropped us off in front of it and flew away. The mortals in the city didn't even blink an eye.

"Well, now what?" Zach asked. "We can't just wander around, this place is huge. We need some sort of game plan."

"I suppose, but for all we know, this could be about Krios and Mount Othrys." James pointed out.

As they talked about what to do, I looked around. It had been a while since I'd been here. But it looked the same: same hot dog vendors, same honking cars, and same tourists. One really loud tourist walked by me with her friend. "And we _have_ to go to Battery Park, by the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel."

I was about to let the comment slide without any thought, when it suddenly registered in my mind. "Percy! What did the note say again?" I asked, interrupting whatever conversation they were having. He repeated it to me and I mentally facepalmed. How did I not know this? "It's the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel. That's where we have to go. It has the double initialed name, and that's where Katie and the Demeter cabin were sent in the Titan War. They destroyed it and turned it into a jungle."

Connor broke out into a smile. "That's it! You figured it out. And people think Hermes kids are stupid."

"Not me…" Will mumbled.

"It doesn't matter. Now let's go!" Leo said, waving us in the direction of the tunnel. We practically ran all the way there.

I stopped, putting my hands on my knees and breathing heavily. Looking up, I saw the note in the middle of the road. Without even thinking about it, I ran into the street to get it.

"Dude, wait!" Connor yelled after me. Ignoring him, I kept going.

Right before getting it, a truck suddenly came and passed right in front of me. The note blew a few feet away, but I grabbed it and ran back to where the others were waiting.

"Bro, you almost had a Regina George moment right there!" Connor yelled at me.

"Hold up. _You've_ watched mean girls? Heck, the only reason _I_ know that is because Seph likes that movie." James said, raising his eyebrow at me and my brother.

I shuddered. "Yeah, Skylar kind of tied us up and put tape over our mouths and forced us to watch it… Note to self: never steal her converse ever again." I said.

Everyone looked at Will, who shrugged. "Sounds like Skylar to me."

"Never mind that. What does the note say?" Frank asked.

I looked down and read it.

_You hated her, and she hated you,_

_No words had ever rang more true._

_But in that sudden moment on the pier,_

_She said words your heart still holds dear._

Katie POV

I opened the door to my and Skylar's room and walked inside. The two sides of the room were totally different, so you could easily tell whose side was whose, but they fit together like a charm.

Skylar had one of those mirror sliding closets and a small bookshelf next to her bed with books about the monsters in the Greek world, weaponry, and volumes 1-4 of Hermes's special pranking books. She grabbed volume 2 and jumped onto the bed. It had a brown blanket with blue and white polka dots everywhere and white and blue pillows, all sizes. On the other side of the bed, there was a small table with a lamp and a picture frame on it. There were bean bags all over the floor, individually colored and matching the bed. All in all, it was perfectly Skylar.

I had a small bookshelf with books about Greek charms and curses and gardening books. They were about things like the different types of plants and the meanings of flowers. I also had a vanity desk, with hair clips and ponytails. Next to that was a modernized bureau. There was a table next to my bed with a lamp on it. My bed had a green and blue striped blanket and individual green and blue pillows. There were small designs of flowers on the pillows.

On the side of the door that was facing inside the room, there was a tack board and white board. The markers on it told me it was magnetic as well. There were two notes on it. The first one read: _There's a garden outside the house for you, Katie!_ I smiled and thanked the gods for not making this place _total_ Hades. I read the second one: _Even though you have closets, there aren't any clothes in them. Every time you need it, there will be a new outfit in them, including shoes and hair requirements, courtesy of moi._ At this I groaned. Of course Aphrodite had to control this part of our… um, _trip_. At least now we knew who was behind all of this.

I tacked the notes back to the board and walked over to my bed, falling backwards onto it. "Ow…" I murmured, as I felt something hard. I pulled back the covers of the bed and saw a picture frame. The picture was… of me and Travis. I remembered this day. It was a cold day, at most 60 degrees, but the entire camp had decided to have a water balloon fight. The picture showed the moment when Travis had fallen on top of me and we were just there, staring into each other's eyes. It had only been for a split second, but it still made me feel lightheaded and strangely happy whenever I thought of it.

"Katie?" Skylar's voice said.

I looked up. "Yeah?"

"I'm going to go tell the others to meet in the living room in half an hour. We really have to talk about what's happening, and figure out what we're going to do about it." she said, and I nodded in agreement.

After she walked out, I put the picture of Travis on the table next to my bed and walked over to the vanity desk. I looked at myself in the mirror and noticed my hair was back to being brown, but there was still one green stripe in it. It actually looked kind of cool.

I thought back to the last moment I saw him. I didn't know why I had reacted the way I did about my hair. Maybe I was just sick of Travis's pranks. Or maybe I was just sick of the fact that he pranked me, and seemed to hate my very existence, when I on the other hand, felt the complete opposite way. Either way, I had not been expecting him to say the things he did. He had been on the verge of bursting out laughing in amusement, when his emotions switched gears and he just snapped.

Turning away from the mirror, I walked to the bureau and opened the door. Inside there was a new outfit for me, with a note from Aphrodite. _Hope you like the sweatshirt!_ I put on the blue bootcut jeans, the green tank top, and the white converse. Then I looked at the sweatshirt I was holding. It was white and had "New York" written across the front in blue letters.

I put the sweatshirt on and fell back onto my bed. The sweatshirt seemed familiar to me somehow. It was weird, but it _smelled_ familiar too. It took me a moment to realize it, but I was wearing Travis's sweatshirt. I debated over taking it off or not, but decided against it and kept it on.

I soon realized how tired I actually was, and decided to take a small nap. After 20 minutes of dreaming about nothing, I woke up to the sound of some very loud music.

"Sorry!" Skylar said, turning the music down. "I found this just sitting on my bed when I came back, and decided to try it out."

"It's fine. I like that song anyway." I said, before noticing that she'd changed as well. "By any chance, is that Will's?" I asked, seeing as she had a blue varsity jacket that had been paired with a black tank top, jeans, and converse like mine.

She nodded. "When I went out, the weather had completely changed from before. It was cloudy, and had just started drizzling. So I was looking for a jacket and I found this." Skylar jumped off her bed and turned the music off. "We should go now."

"Alright," I agreed, getting up. We walked down together and I laid down on the couch, while she fell onto a bean bag.

Soon, everyone was in the living room. "So, I guess we've figured out that this is Aphrodite's doing. But why, and how do we get out? What's happening, Kenna?" Seph asked McKenna, who'd woken up a little bit ago.

"Honestly, I have no clue. I just have this… feeling about this place. It's a safe feeling, but I don't know. And, and sometimes I have these flashes, like flashbacks, but what they mean… I'm not sure." she said, hugging her knees.

Seph nodded. "Alright, then I guess we-" Lightning suddenly flashed, and thunder rolled. The doors to the beach slammed open, and rain began to pour down more heavily.

Reyna stood up and walked over to the door. Looking outside, she said, "I don't see anything. Should we go look?"

In my opinion, we should have just stayed inside, but Skylar got up. "Of course. We couldn't even get those doors open with our swords, and now a little storm does? That isn't right; we have to check it out." Annabeth nodded in agreement, and the rest of us followed them out.

The beach was isolated. The waves were crashing along the shore. In the distance I could see another beach house, which made me feel a bit better, seeing as we weren't completely alone, unless it was empty. That wouldn't help. There was a road behind the beach, probably leading to a town or something, and an empty parking lot near it. Behind that, there were some small hills with trees and greenery on them. Other than that, you couldn't see much… or anyone.

We continued to look around the beach, not finding anything.

"Ow, what the Hades!" Thalia yelled. I looked back to see her rubbing the back of her head, with an annoyed expression on her face.

A boy with dark hair appeared. "Sorry." He said, picking up a Frisbee from the sand.

"Whatever," Thalia grumbled, as he stood up. She glanced at his shirt and back up at him. "Hey, I love Green Day!" she said, her tone becoming nicer.

The boy looked at her and grinned. "Finally, I've actually found someone else who's normal. I'm Ethan, by the way."

She laughed. "Thalia. Besides us, the only other person I know who likes Green Day is Nic-" She stopped speaking abruptly. "Um, never mind," she mumbled. A group of nine other boys appeared behind Ethan. Thalia took a step back towards us.

"Who are you guys?" Annabeth asked suspiciously.

Ethan looked back at them and then at us. "These are my friends. We're staying at the beach house over there." He said, pointing to the house on the other side of the beach. "Looks like we're going to be neighbors."

**AN: What do you think?**

**~Skylar, Seph, McKenna**


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO**

James POV

I took a deep breath as I thought.

"I'm getting sick of these damned clues!" Leo growled. "Haven't we suffered enough? They're probably going to hate us when we find them. So why do we need all of this?"

"Leo," Percy said gently. "We need to find them."

Leo sighed. "I know that, I'm just frustrated. I don't know where to look!"

"We have to look by a pier," Frank said slowly. "I don't know if I've had a memorable moment on one with Hazel…"

"Guys," I announced. "I know where we've gotta go."

"How so?" Connor asked, looking over at me.

"I'll explain on the way," I took a step forward. "A train might be a good idea."

Half an hour later, we were all sitting down on a train heading south. I was tapping my foot idly on the floor as the people around me settled in.

"Tempest," Percy said impatiently, "you mind explaining why in the name of Hades' gym shorts we're going to Florida?"

I looked at him with a raised eyebrow, as thunder sounded. "Nice choice of words," I commented, before starting. "We're going to Neptune Beach."

"Why?" Jason asked.

"My first quest," I explained patiently.

"You mean when we got out of the house?" Will demanded. "You were injured and then we split up looking for a place to stay. And when we found Seph, you were unconscious."

"My head wasn't working right," I admitted, "we were at the beach and I convinced her to go up on this rickety old pier. We were okay for a few minutes, she was just looking into the ocean... it kinda went like this..."

_"I'm sorry," she said quietly._

_I raised an eyebrow, confused. "About what?"_

_She looked over at me and said, "You heard my voice. And maybe if I was more competent you wouldn't have been so worried about me. Maybe you wouldn't be hurt."_

_"You saved my ass!" I protested, my head still pounding._

_"I created an earthquake accidentally!" she snapped back._

_"Hey," I said gently, "you still helped. Isn't that enough?"_

_She was quiet for a moment, looking me dead in the eyes. "They're amazing, you know," she whispered."_

_"What?" I questioned, confused._

_"Your eyes," she replied before her face started reddening. "Oh god, I cannot believe I just said that!"_

_I have no idea what happened next, I blame it on the head injury I sustained, which probably messed up my reasoning skills. I leaned over and kissed her gently, cutting off her babbling._

_She stiffened up and I pulled away a few seconds later. "Something wrong, Seph?"_

_She blinked, "James your head isn't right, I can't do that to you, please just-"_

_A loud cracking noise came from under my feet, and I didn't have time to move before I fell in. A piece of wood came down from the deck and smashed onto my head._

Will blinked, "You kissed Seph while the rest of us were out hunting down a place to sleep?"

"I think I paid for it," I snapped.

Silence consumed us. Percy shooting glares at me every now and then, probably thinking that I broke his sister's heart when I kissed her.

Yawning, I leaned back in my seat beside Travis and drifted off, thinking about Seph.

_I was in a large room, sea green all around. Two severe looking men were looking down at me. One was blonde with my eyes and another had black hair with Seph's eyes. Both of them were glaring at me. As Roman as I was, I was still afraid of being fried and drowned as Jupiter and Poseidon glared down at me._

_Immediately I kneeled, "Father," I said toward Jupiter, "Lord Poseidon," I said paying respect to the Greek god._

_"You may rise, son," Jupiter said, his voice harsh, and slightly annoyed._

_"Alright," Poseidon said, "I don't approve at all about what you did, but I fear it was not your fault. Aphrodite and Ares got into a bad argument a week or so back. We believe that Ares played with your emotions, causing you and your girlfriends to fall into conflict with each other."_

_"Aphrodite insists otherwise," Jupiter sighed, "Venus, her Roman side, as you should know, agrees. She says that he might have had something to do with it, but the thoughts that you had were still there, even if you wouldn't have said anything."_

_"So like when you're drunk," I said, "you say and do things that you want to do but aren't brave enough to do sober."_

_Both gods looked at me strangely for a moment. "Yes, boy," Jupiter said, "you could say it like that, I suppose."_

_Poseidon continued, "So she insists that you need some reconnecting time."_

_"You know," I said irritably, "most couples don't find reconnecting time when they're away from each other!"_

_Poseidon glared down at me for a moment and I thought I was going to go to a watery grave before my time, when he just sighed. "I know. She is sure that this is the best medicine."_

_"Down to the point of why we're here," Jupiter said briskly. "You're going to face many more dangers before you're finished."_

_"This is a test, meant to show your dedication to my daughter." Poseidon said, "I cannot say I disapprove of this part of her scheme."_

_"It is time for you to wake up, son," Jupiter said in his grave voice, "make me proud."_

Well... doesn't that add some pressure onto the situation. My eyes snapped open to Travis shaking my shoulder. "What?" I demanded groggily.

"We need to change transportations," he said quietly. "We can drive the rest of the way. There's a couple of people here who've been looking at us funnily since we've got on. It's setting everyone on edge."

I cringed as I felt their eyes trained on the back of my neck. "Okay..." I trailed off as I heard Travis' stomach growl loudly.

Everyone looked at him strangely.

"It's been at least a day and a half since we've eaten something," he protested defensively.

"Alright," Jason sighed, looking tired and worn down. "We'll stop for some food."

"With what money?" I demanded as we walked out.

A rich-looking woman, with an authentic looking fur jacket and diamond rings littering her fingers, walked past us, her nose high in the air. "Can't believe I used to go for people like that," I sighed, as I saw Connor brush past her.

"That takes care of our money problem," Leo said as we strolled down the street.

"Guys," Percy said as they continued to walk. "We aren't going to be able to eat."

Travis looked at him like he'd just killed his puppy. "Why not?" he demanded.

"Well," Percy said, "we could eat and have to deal with the people behind us that have been stalking us since New York. We're in South Carolina right now, that's a long way to still be following. We need to leave. Now."

"Come on," I sighed, looking around at the streets around me. It was so green, unlike New York. "I don't care about eating. I want to be close enough to Seph for her to be able to backslap me like I deserve."

That was when I remembered the dream. "Guys, remind me after the Stolls steal the car that I have something to tell you."

They all looked at me questioningly for a moment but didn't say a word about it. Percy spoke up, "Alright, Travis, Connor, go and find something for us to use..." he trailed off as the same RV that we had back at Mount Saint Helens came rolling up.

"Its official," Leo murmured, "aside from Hephaestus, Hermes is my favorite god."

The Stolls grinned at Leo and all of us piled into the vehicle. Travis walked over to the wheel. "I'll drive!" He called, starting the vehicle.

We all sat down and Frank was the first person to speak up this time, "What was it that you wanted to tell us."

Taking a deep breath, I told them what I knew, leaving out that Jupiter told me to make him proud, it was the first time that I'd talked to my father and he'd betrayed any emotion. Even though it put pressure on the situation, I was still happy about it and it felt good to know that he believed in me.

"How does it not surprise me that this is a result of a fight between two gods?" Zach asked angrily.

"Trust me," Percy muttered, "we don't mean much to them. It's almost as if we're pawns. We're definitely expendable."

I sighed, "This is still epic bullshit."

The next day, we pulled into Neptune Beach, and it was every bit as beautiful as I remembered. The sandy shore and the waters edged forward invitingly. Well it would have been inviting if it wasn't twenty degrees outside.

"Where's the pier?" Will asked. "Wasn't it a hundred yards or so left of here?"

I nodded, "I think so." Without thinking, I took off running, the clue was so close I could practically feel it right now. No one was at the beach, with it being so cold, so there was no one looking at us like we we're psychopaths, not that I cared.

I heard the others calling my name in confusion and then the sound of footsteps padding the sand behind me, letting me know that they were following. Slowly the pier came into view. My breath caught in my throat, I convinced Seph to go onto that? It looked ready to fall apart! The wood itself looked ready to just crack in half due to the weight of air.

Mentally berating myself, I ran onto the wood, hearing the creaks and groans and praying to Jupiter that it would stay together long enough for me to retrieve the note.

When I got to the end, I wanted to fall to the bottom of the ocean and never come back up... there was no note.

'Wait,' I thought to myself, as I heard the guys catch up with me, 'bottom... I fell in!' Not even stopping to consider the danger of hypothermia, I dived into the icy water.

"JAMES!" was all I heard before I was completely submerged. I managed to get my screaming muscles to work as I kicked down toward the bottom, my teeth chattering so hard, I was afraid that I was accidentally going to cut my tongue off.

I saw something glowing deeper down in the water. I heard a splash and I figured that Percy was coming after me. I didn't care though, I swam as fast as I could through the depths, the salt burning my eyes as I fought to keep them open. Finally, I snagged the paper, dead tired.

I figured I had around ten seconds before I passed out, when an arm grabbed my wrist and started hauling me back to the surface. After what felt like forever I was able to breathe again. I kept a firm grip on the paper as I was pulled back up onto the dock. I laid there limply, trying desperately to conserve my dangerously low body heat. Painful tremors were wracking my body.

Percy was beside me, trying his damnedest to get me dry. Percy was scolding me, saying, "Gods Tempest, you're such a dumbass! Seph's gonna kill both of us when she hears about this."

I didn't have the energy to respond.

"What does the note say?" Percy demanded as he worked on soaking the water from my body.

Zach reached down and snagged the still dry paper from my hands. He was about to read when we heard an almighty roar. If I hadn't been in such a bad situation, I might have laughed, it was the first time I'd ever heard Frank swear. Considering that there was a huge, green, ugly sea monster above us, I found humor kind of hard to come by.

It was as if I was looking through a tunnel as Percy looked at the monster boredly. "Freddy," he snapped, "get back into deep sea! What did my dad tell you about being so close to shore?"

Freddy the sea monster roared and I noticed the water beneath him swirling around like a whirlpool. Next thing I know we're alone again. Percy seemed a bit exhausted but the angry light probably would have made me scared if I wasn't so drained.

I half way walked and was half way dragged back to the RV. "Zach," Frank said as he helped me down onto the couch, "what does the note say?"

_Although they thought you'd amount to nothing,_

_You shocked them with powers worthy of a king._

_Now go back to where you were first rescued,_

_To find the key and end your heartbreaking feud._

Seph POV

"Neighbors?" I questioned aloud, looking at all of them. There was only one word that would describe them: hot.

We all stood there for a second the rain still falling down lightly until a cold wind ripped through us. I wrapped up tighter in the Breaking Benjamin hoody that I'd found on my bed. It was the one that James had, it even smelled like him. I didn't know how Aphrodite managed to get it, but I was grateful that she did.

'We should probably go in," one of the guys said from the front, "this girl, here," he gestured to me and smiled, "with the excellent taste in music, is cold." He had neat blonde hair, brown eyes and a full blown smile that was cute.

I blushed before smiling back, "You like Breaking Benjamin?"

"Are you kidding?" he questioned, "Between them and Lifehouse, I don't know who's better!"

It was official, I could fire Leo from the best guy friend position, this guy was cool and I didn't even know his name!

"You want to come into our house?" Hazel asked, standing beside a really buff guy with a nice tan, close cropped, dirty blonde hair, and bright green eyes.

"Sure," the guys chorused. The boy who liked Breaking Benjamin came up to me and said, "I'm Blake by the way."

I grinned at him and said, "I'm Seph."

"That's a strange name," he commented as we all walked back in, trying to get dry by the conveniently roaring fireplace.

"You know, I didn't say anything about yours, which happens to have a Scooby Doo reference to it," I informed him.

He held his hands up in mock surrender, "Well played."

"It's a nickname," I explained not wanting to keep him confused, "my real name is a bit of a mouthful. No one really uses it."

"Really," he said, his elbows on his knees as we sat on the rug of the front room, the fire lighting up his face. He seemed so absorbed into what I was saying that it was kind of strange at first. "And what's your real name?"

"Persephone," I answered, "tell any of your friends and die."

He smirked, "I can't see anyone as nice and as pretty as you holding a weapon let alone kill anyone."

I smiled at him. Oh, if he only knew… I leaned forward and said, "Flattery will get you nowhere."

It didn't feel right when he called me pretty. It wasn't the same as when James did it. James as soon as his name came to my mind, I immediately saddened. Blake seemed to notice the change in my mood. He looked at me concerned and said, "Seph, is something wrong?"

"No," I said, "I'm just a bit distracted."

"You wanna talk about it?" He questioned.

I opened my mouth to tell him no. I knew James probably would be jealous, but I wasn't interested in anyone else, besides, I really didn't care about what James thought at that particular moment. "You sure you wanna listen?"

"Why not," he said, smiling, "you seem like a pretty interesting person so far."

I found myself grinning back. This was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

**AN: Can anyone guess where they're going next?**

**~Skylar, Seph, McKenna**


End file.
